"It was not long after we were married," she said presently. "We married young, you know, and old Mr. Greene was very angry with Geoffrey for making writing his career. He had been in his father's engineering works first of all and then found he was too unhappy to go on with it. I was engaged to him then and I encouraged him to go on with his writing. I said I'd marry him as soon as he liked and not mind about being poor, but he wasn't to start on a career he didn't care for. So I went to Papa and said I was going to marry Geoffrey at once and would do it more happily if I had his permission." Mrs. Greene laughed her quiet infrequent laugh as she added contentedly: "I was a bold young thing, you know. In those days it was a different matter to beard your father. But I didn't care for anything but Geoffrey, and Papa behaved very nicely to me. He gave me this as one of my wedding presents." She groped among the cases, opened one, and displayed an old-fashioned round brooch consisting of a large amethyst surrounded by pearls in an elaborate gold setting. "It looks clumsy now," she said, touching it with kindly fingers. "But round brooches were all the fashion then and I was very pleased with it. Mamma was very angry about my marriage, but then she was a very narrow woman; she never moved with the times." Miss Dorset enjoyed a momentary flash of insight. She perceived that the old lady sitting beside her, herself a great-grandmother, was speaking of her mother, whose memory would normally be blurred by the clouds of half a century, in just the tones of clear resentment that any young woman might employ to-day. Mrs. Greene was back in the past, and even Miss Dorset caught something of the combined fire and delicacy that must have inspired such independence, such courage, and--according to the standards of 1870--such immodesty as to enable a betrothed young girl to arrange her own marriage in the teeth of her mother's disapproval. For a moment it was all so vivid to Miss Dorset that she gave way to a spasm of indignation and admiration. "Parents were far too harsh," she said. "It was shocking of the old father to try and push Mr. Greene into a business he didn't care for, but it must be splendid for you to think how you helped Mr. Greene to succeed." Mrs. Greene only answered by a vague: "What do you say?" She had leaped thirty years and was fingering rather sadly a star sapphire beautifully set in diamonds to form a brooch. Presently she laid it down and sitting with her hands folded in her lap fell into one of those wideawake trances that ended too often in melancholy. "What a beautiful brooch that is," ventured Miss Dorset. There was no answer and no indication that Mrs. Greene had even heard the remark. Miss Dorset tried again. "Is it a star sapphire?" she asked. "I don't think I've ever seen one like that." Mrs. Greene roused herself, but she spoke heavily and limply.