posite side of the room, nodded in his casual way,
neither hostile nor friendly, but gentle and indifferent. You couldn't
make Denis seem angry, or hurt, or agitated in any way whatever. He had
always the air of reserving his opinion; and he extremely disliked
scenes. To be present at this one must have been painful to him. Peter,
who knew him so well, knew that. He liked things to go easily and
smoothly always. He had winced at the crash of glass on marble; it seemed
to him in such bad taste. This, no doubt, was his attitude towards the
whole business; towards the Magerisons' behaviour, Cheriton's exposure
of it, and this final naked, shameful scene of accusation and confession.

Peter was realising this as he put on his coat in the hall, when the door
he had shut behind him was opened, and steps followed him. He started and
faced round, a hope leaping in his face. The swift dying of it left him
rather pale.

Leslie said, "I'm coming too."

It was good of Leslie, thought Peter dully, and not caring in the least.
He said, "No, stay and dine. Really, I'd like you to.... We'll talk
to-morrow."

Leslie put on his overcoat and said to the footman, "Call a gondola,"
and the footman stood on the steps and cried "_Poppe_" till a _poppe_
came; then they swung away down a rose-flushed water-street with the
after-glow in their eyes.

Leslie was restful; he didn't bother one. He merely said, "We'll dine
to-night at Luigi's."

It was not until they had done so, and were having coffee outside, that
Peter said, "We'll have to leave Venice, of course, directly we can."

"You too?" said Leslie. "You go with them?"

"I go with them," said Peter. "Well, I can't well stay here, can I. And
we may as well stick together--a family party..... You see, I haven't a
notion what Hilary will do to live now. I can go into business of sorts.
Hilary can't; he'd hate it so. Hilary's not business-like, you know. Nor
is Peggy. I couldn't trust them by themselves; they'd tumble into
something and get broken. They need my common sense to sustain them."

Leslie said, "What's the matter with your own line of life, that you want
to chuck it?"

Peter looked at him in surprise.

"It's chucked me," he said. "Violently--with a smash. You don't suppose
anyone will hire me again to buy their things for them? There'll be
something of a crab on the Margerison family in future. It's going to
be made very public, you know, this business; I gathered that.