already knew, for as soon as the result was declared Nick had
despatched a mounted man to her, carrying the figures on a scrawled
card. He himself had been far from getting away at once, having to
respond to the hubbub of acclamation, to speak yet again, to thank his
electors individually and collectively, to chaff the Tories without
cheap elation, to be carried hither and yon, and above all to pretend
that the interest of the business was now greater for him than ever. If
he had said never a word after putting himself in Julia's hands to go
home it was partly perhaps because the consciousness had begun to
glimmer within him, on the contrary, of some sudden shrinkage of that
interest. He wanted to see his mother because he knew she wanted to fold
him close in her arms. They had been open there for this purpose the
last half-hour, and her expectancy, now no longer an ache of suspense,
was the reason of Julia's round pace. Yet this very impatience in her
somehow made Nick wince a little. Meeting his mother was like being
elected over again.

The others had not yet come back, and Lady Agnes was alone in the
large, bright drawing-room. When Nick went in with Julia he saw her at
the further end; she had evidently been walking up and down the whole
length of it, and her tall, upright, black figure seemed in possession
of the fair vastness after the manner of an exclamation-point at the
bottom of a blank page. The room, rich and simple, was a place of
perfection as well as of splendour in delicate tints, with precious
specimens of French furniture of the last century ranged against walls
of pale brocade, and here and there a small, almost priceless picture.
George Dallow had made it, caring for these things and liking to talk
about them--scarce ever about anything else; so that it appeared to
represent him still, what was best in his kindly, limited nature, his
friendly, competent, tiresome insistence on harmony--on identity of
"period." Nick could hear him yet, and could see him, too fat and with a
congenital thickness in his speech, lounging there in loose clothes with
his eternal cigarette. "Now my dear fellow, _that_'s what I call form: I
don't know what you call it"--that was the way he used to begin. All
round were flowers in rare vases, but it looked a place of which the
beauty would have smelt sweet even without them.

Lady Agnes had taken a white rose from one of the clusters and was
holding it to her face, which was