Laura Glyde, "that it's just the
dark hopelessness of it all--the wonderful tone-scheme of black on
black--that makes it such an artistic achievement? It reminded me so
when I read it of Prince Rupert's maniere noire... the book is etched,
not painted, yet one feels the colour values so intensely..."

"Who is HE?" Mrs. Leveret whispered to her neighbour. "Some one she's
met abroad?"

"The wonderful part of the book," Mrs. Ballinger conceded, "is that it
may be looked at from so many points of view. I hear that as a study of
determinism Professor Lupton ranks it with 'The Data of Ethics.'"

"I'm told that Osric Dane spent ten years in preparatory studies
before beginning to write it," said Mrs. Plinth. "She looks up
everything--verifies everything. It has always been my principle, as
you know. Nothing would induce me, now, to put aside a book before I'd
finished it, just because I can buy as many more as I want."

"And what do YOU think of 'The Wings of Death'?" Mrs. Roby abruptly
asked her.

It was the kind of question that might be termed out of order, and the
ladies glanced at each other as though disclaiming any share in such a
breach of discipline. They all knew that there was nothing Mrs. Plinth
so much disliked as being asked her opinion of a book. Books were
written to read; if one read them what more could be expected? To be
questioned in detail regarding the contents of a volume seemed to her
as great an outrage as being searched for smuggled laces at the Custom
House. The club had always respected this idiosyncrasy of Mrs. Plinth's.
Such opinions as she had were imposing and substantial: her mind, like
her house, was furnished with monumental "pieces" that were not meant
to be suddenly disarranged; and it was one of the unwritten rules of
the Lunch Club that, within her own province, each member's habits
of thought should be respected. The meeting therefore closed with
an increased sense, on the part of the other ladies, of Mrs. Roby's
hopeless unfitness to be one of them.

II

Mrs. Leveret, on the eventful day, had arrived early at Mrs.
Ballinger's, her volume of Appropriate Allusions in her pocket.

It always flustered Mrs. Leveret to be late at the Lunch Club: she liked
to collect her thoughts and gather a hint, as the others assembled, of
the turn the conversation was likely to take. To-day, however, she
felt herself completely at a loss; and even the familiar contact of
Appropriate Allu