Her hat and jacket were off and hanging from the peg, and still George did not come. This was the first time he had ever not been there to hold the chair for her, to take her hat and hang up her bag, dangling it in his fingers as though it were something he’d never seen before—something fairy. And how quiet the shop was! There was not a sound even from Madame. Only the wind blew, shaking the old house; the wind hooted, and the portraits of Ladies of the Pompadour Period looked down and smiled, cunning and sly. Monica wished she hadn’t come. Oh, what a mistake to have come! Fatal. Fatal. Where was George? If he didn’t appear the next moment she would go away. She took off the white kimono. She didn’t want to look at herself any more. When she opened a big pot of cream on the glass shelf her fingers trembled. There was a tugging feeling at her heart as though her happiness—her marvellous happiness—were trying to get free. “I’ll go. I’ll not stay.” She took down her hat. But just at that moment steps sounded, and, looking in the mirror, she saw George bowing in the doorway. How queerly he smiled! It was the mirror of course. She turned round quickly. His lips curled back in a sort of grin, and—wasn’t he unshaved?—he looked almost green in the face. “Very sorry to have kept you waiting,” he mumbled, sliding, gliding forward. Oh, no, she wasn’t going to stay. “I’m afraid,” she began. But he had lighted the gas and laid the tongs across, and was holding out the kimono. “It’s a wind,” he said. Monica submitted. She smelled his fresh young fingers pinning the jacket under her chin. “Yes, there is a wind,” said she, sinking back into the chair. And silence fell. George took out the pins in his expert way. Her hair tumbled back, but he didn’t hold it as he usually did, as though to feel how fine and soft and heavy it was. He didn’t say it “was in a lovely condition.” He let it fall, and, taking a brush out of a drawer, he coughed faintly, cleared his throat and said dully: “Yes, it’s a pretty strong one, I should say it was.” She had no reply to make. The brush fell on her hair. Oh, oh, how mournful, how mournful! It fell quick and light, it fell like leaves; and then it fell heavy, tugging like the tugging at her heart. “That’s enough,” she cried, shaking herself free.