sses on which the heads and
breasts had been painted by Rubens and everything else by Rubens's
regiment of hirelings. The guiding footman preceded him through a
great chamber which he recognised as the drawing-room in its winding
sheet, and then up a small and insignificant staircase; and G.J. was
on ground strange to him, for never till then had he been higher than
the first-floor in Lechford House.

Lady Queenie's apartments did violence to G.J.'s sensibilities as an
upholder of traditionalism in all the arts, of the theory that every
sound movement in any art must derive from its predecessor. Some
months earlier he had met for a few minutes the creative leader of the
newest development in internal decoration, and he vividly remembered a
saying of the grey-haired, slouch-hatted man: "At the present day
the only people in the world with really vital perceptions about
decoration are African niggers, and the only inspiring productions are
the coloured cotton stuffs designed for the African native market."
The remark had amused and stimulated him, but he had never troubled to
go in search of examples of the inspiring influence of African taste
on London domesticity. He now saw perhaps the supreme instance lodged
in Lechford House, like a new and truculent state within a great
Empire.

Lady Queenie had imposed terms on her family, and under threats of
rupture, of separation, of scandal, Lady Queenie's exotic nest had
come into existence in the very fortress of unchangeable British
convention. The phenomenon was a war phenomenon due to the war,
begotten by the war; for Lady Queenie had said that if she was to
do war-work without disaster to her sanity she must have the right
environment. Thus the putting together of Lady Queenie's nest had
proceeded concurrently with the building of national projectile
factories and of square miles of offices for the girl clerks of
ministries and departments of government.

The footman left G.J. alone in a room designated the boudoir. G.J.
resented the boudoir, because it was like nothing that he had
ever witnessed. The walls were irregularly covered with rhombuses,
rhomboids, lozenges, diamonds, triangles, and parallelograms; the
carpet was treated likewise, and also the upholstery and the cushions.
The colourings of the scene in their excessive brightness, crudity and
variety surpassed G.J.'s conception of the possible. He had learned
the value of colour before Queen was born, and in