Rainham was already beginning to consider himself secure from the inconvenient allusions to Lightmark and their altered relations, which he had at first nervously anticipated. Oswyn rarely mentioned the other painter's name, and accepted, without surprise or the faintest appearance of a desire for explanation, the self-evident fact of the breach between the two quondam allies; regarding it as in the natural course of events, and as an additional link in the chain of their intimacy. Indeed, Lightmark had long ceased to be a component element of the atmosphere of Brodonowski's: he no longer brought the sunshine of his expansive, elaborate presence into the limits of the dingy little place; nor did its clever, shabby constituents, with their bright-eyed contempt for the popular slaves of a fatuous public, care to swell the successful throng who worshipped the rising genius in his new temple in Grove Road. The fact that in those days Rainham avoided Lightmark's name, once so often quoted; his demeanour, when the more ignorant or less tactical of their mutual acquaintances pressed him with inquiries as to the well-being and work of his former friend, had not failed to suggest to the intimate circle that there had been a rupture, a change, something far more significant than the general severance which had gradually been effected between them, the unreclaimed children of the desert, and Richard Lightmark, the brilliant society painter; something as to which it seemed that explanation would not be forthcoming, as to which questions were undesirable. The perception of this did not demand much subtlety, and, in accordance with the instincts of their craft, Rainham's reticence was respected. "It was curious, when you come to think of it," Copal said reflectively one evening after his return from a late autumnal ramble in Finistere, and while the situation was still new to him, "very curious. Rainham and Lightmark were inseparable; so were Rainham and Oswyn. And all the time Lightmark and Oswyn were about as friendly as the toad and the harrow. Sounds like Euclid, doesn't it? Things equal to the same thing, and quite unequal to one another." "Yes," assented McAllister, thoughtfully stroking his reddish beard. "And there was a time--not so very long ago, either--when Lightmark and Oswyn were on pretty good terms too!" "Ah, well; most people quarrel with old Oswyn sooner or later. But it certainly does look a little as if--as if Lightmark had done something and the other two had found it out--Oswyn first. However, it's no business of ours. I suppose he's safe to be elected next week,--though he isn't a Scotchman, eh, Sandy old man?" "Quite," said the other laconically. And then their conversation was modulated into a less personal key as they resumed their discussion of the colony of American _pleinairistes_ with whom Rathbone had foregathered at Pontaven, and of the "paintability" of fields of _sarrasin_ and poplars.