aces, young and old; and the cashiers in their cages
gathering in money as fast as they could lay their tired hands on it! A
joyous, brilliant scene, calculated to bring soft tears of satisfaction
to the board of directors that presided over Bostock's. It was a record
Christmas for Bostock's. The electric cars were thundering over the
frozen streets of all the Five Towns to bring customers to Bostock's.
Children dreamt of Bostock's. Fathers went to scoff and remained to
pay. Brunt's was not exactly alarmed, for nothing could alarm Brunt's;
but there was just a sort of suspicion of something in the air at
Brunt's that did not make for odious self-conceit. People seemed to
become intoxicated when they went into Bostock's, to close their heads
in a frenzy of buying.

And there the art nouveau music-stool stood in the corner, where Vera
had originally seen it! She approached it, not thinking of the terrible
danger. The compartments for music lay invitingly open.

'Four pounds, nine and six, Mrs Cheswardine,' said a shop-walker, who
knew her.

She stopped to finger it.

Well, of course everybody is acquainted with that peculiar ecstasy that
undoubtedly does overtake you in good shops, sometimes, especially at
Christmas. I prefer to call it ecstasy rather than intoxication, but I
have heard it called even drunkenness. It is a magnificent and
overwhelming experience, like a good wine. A blind instinct seizes your
reason and throws her out of the window of your soul, and then assumes
entire control of the volitional machinery. You listen to no arguments,
you care for no consequences. You want a thing; you must have it; you
do have it.

Vera was caught unawares by this magnificent and overwhelming
experience, just as she stooped to finger the music-stool. A fig for
the cigar-cabinet! A fig for her husband's objections! After all she
was a grown-up woman (twenty-nine or thirty), and entitled to a certain
freedom. She was not and would not be a slave. It would look perfect in
the drawing-room.

'I'll take it,' she said.

'Yes, Mrs Cheswardine. A unique thing, quite unique. Penkethman!'

And Vera followed Penkethman to a cash desk and received half-a-guinea
out of a five-pound note.

'I want it carefully packed,' said Vera.

'Yes, ma'am. It will be delivered in the morning.'

She was just beginning to realize that she had been under the sinister
influence of the ecstasy, and that she had not bought the
cigar-cabinet,