'But I'm only going to fetch Edith Ottley for a drive,' said Hyacinth. 'How bored she must get with her little Foreign Office clerk! The way he takes his authority as a husband seriously is pathetic. He hasn't the faintest idea the girl is cleverer than he is.' 'You'd far better leave her alone, and not point it out,' said Anne. 'You're always bothering about these little Ottleys now. But you've been very restless lately. Whenever you try to do people good, and especially when you motor so much and so fast, I recognise the symptoms. It's coming on again, and you're trying to get away from it.' 'Don't say that. I'm never going to care about anyone again,' said Hyacinth. 'You don't know it, but when you're not in love you're not yourself,' Anne continued. 'It's all you live for.' 'Oh, Anne!' 'It's quite true. It's nearly three months since you--had an attack. Blair was the last. Now you're beginning to take the same sort of interest in Cecil Reeve.' 'How mistaken you are, Anne! I don't take at all the same interest in him. It's a totally different thing. I don't really even like him.' 'You wouldn't go out today if you were expecting him.' 'Yes, but I'm not ... and he doesn't care two straws about me. Once he said he never worshipped in a crowded temple!' 'It's a curious coincidence that ever since then you've been out to everyone else,' said Anne. 'I don't really like him--so very much. When he _does_ smile, of course it's rather nice. Why does he hate me?' 'I can't think,' said Anne. 'He doesn't hate me! How can you say so?' cried Hyacinth. 'Doesn't he?' 'Perhaps it's because he thinks I look Spanish. He may disapprove of looking Spanish,' suggested Hyacinth. 'Very likely.' Hyacinth laughed, kissed her, and went out. Anne followed her graceful figure with disapproving, admiring eyes. CHAPTER II The Anxieties of Sir Charles Like all really uncommon beauties, Hyacinth could only be adequately described by the most hackneyed phrases. Her eyes were authentically sapphire-coloured; brilliant, frank eyes, with a subtle mischief in them, softened by the most conciliating long eyelashes. Then, her mouth was really shaped like a Cupid's bow, and her teeth _were_ dazzling; also she had a wealth of dense, soft, brown hair and a tall, sylphlike, slimly-rounded figure. Her features were delicately regular, and her hands and feet perfection. Her complexion was extremely fair, so she was not a brunette; some remote Spanish ancestor on her mother's side was, however, occasionally mentioned as an apology for a type and a supple grace sometimes complained of by people with white eyelashes as rather un-English. So many artistic young men had told her she was like La Gioconda, that when she first saw the original in the Louvre she was so disappointed that she thought she would never smile again.