. When I am tired the chapter will end. I don't know if this is what novelists do. It does not matter, as I am not writing a novel. I know it is not what Rudd does. He told me h

terse, by leaving out. You must say everything first. You can rub o

k in charcoal.

dapper about him. I was quite wrong about his appearance. He wears a black tie. Princes

did not know. She said he was agreeable, bu

te being with royalties, authors and artists. Mr. Rudd can talk of nothing except his art, and I like T

often fantastic, with a certai

fashioned. It is no use to try and co

her a novel by Rud

e uncomfortable when I talked to him. As it is, as the idiot

hought would interest her. I told her how Rud

as writing something for his own

not intend t

f Jean Brandon. I know her well. I have known her for five years. They come here every yea

ether she

hether they were blue or grey. Graceful. Pretty hands. Badly dressed, but from poverty and economy more than from mauvais go?t. A very English beauty. "You will probably tell me she is Scotch or Irish. I don't

as gone out, for the time being, at any rate.

s sombres d

r aube ébl

mp. It could be lit, I know. Once, two years ago, at the races here at Bavigny, I saw her excited. She wanted a friend to win a steeplechase and he

unhappy? The reason was a simple one, she was poor, a

he question on which the whole of their lives is to depend. You let a girl marry her first love. It is too absurd. It never lasts. I do not say that marriages in our country do not often turn out very badly. No one knows that better than I do, Heaven knows; but I s

aking the right choice. It was sometimes successful. Besides, when there were real obstacles the marriages did not as a rule come off. Mrs. Lennox had told me that Miss Brandon had been engaged when she was nineteen to a man in th

ess Kouragine. "And she would have been mo

s Brandon lived. She said the worst kind of poverty was to live with people richer than yourself. It was a continual strain, she knew it from experience. She had been throug

clothes which were the trouble. I can see that that poor Jean suffers in the same way. And then, what a life! To spend all one's time

not married. Surely lots of me

took her out in London. She brought her to Haréville when the London season began and

till faithful to the man she had be

très bien, but he hadn't a penny. It appeared, however, that he had a relation, possibly an uncle, who

ps Miss Brandon w

they were engaged, and he has been away for the last five years. Peo

und, but she thought she had not yet met anyone whom she felt she would like to marry. Nor was it

the shady side, not the world of adventurers and gamblers, but the world of international "culture." All the intellectual snobs were drawn instinctively to Mrs. Lennox. People who discovered new musicians, new novelis

otland, and passionately fond of outdoor life, would find a husband among people who were discussing all day long whether Wagner was not better as a writer than a musician? She never complains of it, poor child, but I know quite well that she is écoeurée. She has had five years of it. Her father died five

t it. Girls often struck out a line fo

pathetic as far as that kind of thing was concerned, apathetic now about everything. S

nged for her, all this would not have happene

she was being faithf

her that she had never loved, "elle n'a jam

he thought her capable of such

e Princess, "but I have; only for one momen

of the character. He hardly knew h

ce gave him an idea and he made his own character, but he thought he was

erves nothing," s

said we had not got as far as the h

he call the nov

t length. He had not found a title that satisfied him.

she said. "Cette enfa

get Rudd to discu

t be difficult. Then we will compare notes. It will be most amusing. The Princess wit