Mrs. Duchemin stood motionless and very slowly redness mounted into her face. It was most curious to see against that scarlet background the vivid white of the eyes and the dark, straight eyebrows that nearly met. And, slowly again her face went perfectly white; then her dark blue eyes became marked. She seemed to wipe her long, white hands one in the other, inserting her right hand into her left and drawing it out again. "I'm sorry," she said in a dead voice. "We had hoped that, if that man went to France--or if other things happened--we might have continued on the old friendly footing. But you yourself must see that, with our official position, we can't be expected to connive . . ." Valentine said: "I don't understand!" "Perhaps you'd rather I didn't go on!" Mrs. Duchemin retorted. "I'd much rather not go on." "You'd probably better," Valentine answered. "We had meant," the elder woman said, "to have a quiet little dinner--we two and you, before the party--for auld lang syne. But that fellow has forced himself in, and you see for yourself that we can't have you as well." Valentine said: "I don't see why not. I always like to see Mr. Tietjens!" Mrs. Duchemin looked hard at her. "I don't see the use," she said, "of your keeping on that mask. It is surely bad enough that your mother should go about with that man and that terrible scenes like that of the other Friday should occur. Mrs. Tietjens was heroic; nothing less than heroic. But you have no right to subject us, your friends, to such ordeals." Valentine said: "You mean . . . Mrs. Christopher Tietjens . . ." Mrs. Duchemin went on: "My husband insists that I should ask you. But I will not. I simply will not. I invented for you the excuse of the frock. Of course we could have given you a frock if that man is so mean or so penniless as not to keep you decent. But I repeat, with our official position we cannot--we cannot; it would be madness!--connive at this intrigue. And all the more as the wife appears likely to be friendly with us. She has been once: she may well come again." She paused and went on solemnly: "And I warn you, if the split comes--as it must, for what woman could stand it!--it is Mrs. Tietjens we shall support. She will always find a home here." An extraordinary picture of Sylvia Tietjens standing beside Edith Ethel and dwarfing her as a giraffe dwarfs an emu, came into Valentine's head. She said: "Ethel! Have I gone mad? Or is it you? Upon my word I can't understand. . . ." Mrs. Duchemin exclaimed: "For God's sake hold your tongue, you shameless thing! You've had a child by the man, haven't you?" Valentine saw suddenly the tall silver candlesticks, the dark polished panels of the rectory and Edith Ethel's mad face and mad hair whirling before them. She said: