air of impatient
melancholy, note after note and letter after letter, and dropping the
envelopes into a waste-paper basket beside her. A cigarette was between
her lips; her hair, not dressed, was coiled loosely upon her head; she
wore a white silk _peignoir_ bordered with white fur and girdled with a
sash of silver tissue. She had just come from her bath and her face,
though weary, had the freshness of a prolonged toilet.

The room where she sat, with its grand piano and its deep chairs, its
sofa and its capacious writing-table, was accurately adjusted to her
needs. It, too, was all in white, carpet, curtains and dimity coverings.
Madame von Marwitz laughed at her own vagary; but it had had only once
to be clearly expressed, and the greens and pinks that had adorned her
sitting-room at Mrs. Forrester's were banished as well as the
rose-sprigged toilet set and hangings of the bedroom. "I cannot breathe
among colours," she had said. "They seem to press upon me. White is like
the air; to live among colours, with all their beauty, is like swimming
under the water; I can only do it with comfort for a little while."

Madame von Marwitz looked up presently at a wonderful little clock of
gold and enamel that stood before her and then struck, not impatiently,
but with an intensification of the air of melancholy, an antique silver
bell that stood beside the clock. Louise entered.

"Where is Mademoiselle?" Madame von Marwitz asked, speaking in French.
Louise answered that Mademoiselle had gone out to take Victor for his
walk, Victor being Madame von Marwitz's St. Bernard who remained in
England during his mistress's absences.

"You should have taken Victor yourself, Louise," said Madame von
Marwitz, not at all unkindly, but with decisive condemnation. "You know
that I like Mademoiselle to help me with my letters in the morning."

Louise, her permanent plaintiveness enhanced, murmured that she had a
bad headache and that Mademoiselle had kindly offered to take Victor,
had said that she would enjoy taking him.

"Moreover," Madame von Marwitz pursued, as though these excuses were not
worthy of reply, "I do not care for Mademoiselle to be out alone in such
a fog. You should have known that, too. As for the dress, don't fail to
send it back this morning--as you should have done last night."

"Mademoiselle thought we might arrange it to please Madame."

"You should have known better, if Mademoiselle did not. Mademoiselle has
ve