A little later Thornton put her into a cab, and she drove home. The cold night air invigorated her relaxed body, but seemed to benumb her mind. She could not think--only feel Thornton's kisses upon her. The rest of the subjective and objective universe was a blank. Only when the cab stopped and the driver asked the number of her house through the trap-door in the roof, was she conscious of external things. Then she found that he had driven a long way past the familiar door. As he turned round grumblingly, she was aware of being chilled through from her drive across London, and longed to get indoors. It was not until she told Winifred the next morning that she realised the great change that had come over her life. “I am going to marry Mr. Hammerdyke.” The commonplace statement, thus uttered for the first time, seemed like a cold decree of fate, inevitable, irresistible. Winifred cried a little at the thought of losing her. “But you will be happy, my darling,” she said, smiling through her tears. “He is so brave and strong and handsome, and he must love you better than his life.” “Yes, dear,” said Clytie, gently stroking her friend's brown hair (Winifred was sitting at her feet) and looking tenderly at her pure, upturned face. But her own, bent down, was aflame with reminiscence. “When is it to be? Not for a long, long time, I hope,” said Winifred. “Almost immediately--he wants it--there is no particular reason for waiting.” “I felt it was coming some day,” said Winifred; “but I did not expect it so soon.” “It is best,” said Clytie--“best that it should be at once; the interval between the old life and the new would be too trying if it were drawn out.” “You always do what is best, dear,” whispered Winifred in her trustful way. “Oh! you must be happy, very, very happy, Clytie dear.” Clytie leaned back in her chair, caressing her friend's cheek with the back of her hand, and looked around the studio. It came almost as a shock to her to realise that in a short, short time she would have to bid farewell to all that had grown up around her artistic life. The grotesque caricatures on the walls stared at her like meaningless shadows. Her palette, brushes, and paraphernalia of rags and turpentine bottles lay strewn about like the properties of a forgotten comedy. The unfinished pictures on easels and stands lost their fascination. Only Winifred's little study on the other side of the studio seemed unchanged--retaining its virginal freshness and purity. But the sound of a step on the landing outside, buoyant, elastic, dispelled all wistful regrets. She sprang to her feet as Winifred rose, and listened, transformed into a radiant woman, with quivering depths in her dark blue eyes, her red lips parted in a half smile, her chin raised showing the full neck. A moment or two afterwards Mrs. Gurkins appeared at the studio door. “Mr. Hammerdyke, miss. I have shown him into the sitting-room,” she said, and then retired.