'Don't let us go into that, Miss Yeo. Of course, Hyacinth is a beautiful--responsibility. People seem to think she ought to have gone on living with us when she left school. But how was it possible? Hyacinth said she intended to live for her art, and Lady Cannon couldn't stand the scent of oils.' He glanced round the large panelled-oak room in which not a picture was to be seen. The only indication of its having ever been meant for a studio was the north light, carefully obstructed (on the grounds of unbecomingness) by gently-tinted draperies of some fabric suggesting Liberty's. 'Life wasn't worth living, trying to keep the peace!' 'But you must have missed her?' 'Still, I prefer coming to see her here. And knowing she has you with her is, after all, everything.' He looked a question. 'Yes, she has. I mean, she seems rather--absorbed again lately,' said Anne. 'Who is it?' he asked. 'I always feel so indiscreet and treacherous talking over her private affairs like this with you, though she tells me everything herself. I'm not sure it's the act of a simple, loyal, Christian English gentleman; in fact, I'm pretty certain it's not. I suppose that's why I enjoy it so much.' 'I daresay,' said Anne; 'but she wouldn't mind it.' 'What has been happening?' 'Nothing interesting. Hazel Kerr came here the other day and brought with him a poem in bronze lacquer, as he called it. He read it aloud--the whole of it.' 'Good heavens! Poetry! Do people still do that sort of thing? I thought it had gone out years ago--when I was a young man.' 'Of course, so it has. But Hazel Kerr is out of date. Hyacinth says he's almost a classic.' 'His verses?' 'Oh no! His method. She says he's an interesting survival--he's walked straight out of another age--the nineties, you know. There were poets in those days.' 'Method! He was much too young then to have a style at all, surely!' 'That _was_ the style. It was the right thing to be very young in the nineties. It isn't now.' 'It's not so easy now, for some of us,' murmured Sir Charles. 'But Hazel keeps it up,' Anne answered. Sir Charles laughed irritably. 'He keeps it up, does he? But he sits people out openly, that shows he's not really dangerous. One doesn't worry about Hazel. It's that young man who arrives when everybody's going, or goes before anyone else arrives, that's what I'm a little anxious about.' 'If you mean Cecil Reeve, Hyacinth says he doesn't like her.' 'I'm sorry to hear that. If anything will interest her, that will. Yet I don't know why I should mind. At any rate, he certainly isn't trying to marry her for interested reasons, as he's very well off--or perhaps for any reasons. I'm told he's clever, too.' 'His appearance is not against him either,' said Anne dryly; 'so what's the matter with him?' 'I don't know exactly. I think he's capable of playing with her.' 'Perhaps he doesn't really appreciate her,' suggested Anne.