So the rain beat, the gutter choked, the chariots of God thundered overhead, one ray of sunlight gleamed, and again the rain, pitiless and slow, spoke of an alien land. And at the end, in the moment’s silence, more appreciative than any applause, which followed, Martin’s glance again sought the great pianist, and with a sudden spasm of joy, so keen that for a moment he thought he must shout or laugh, he saw that Karl Rusoff had taken off his spectacles and was wiping his eyes. The party that Frank had brought together that evening was very typical of his tastes and of the position which he held in the world. Though only thirty, thanks partly to the great wealth which was always completely at the service of any artistic cause, but chiefly to his own exquisite and unerring artistic sense, he had now for some years been a sort of accredited godfather to any new talent, and for any one to “come out” at his house was a guarantee that the aspirant was to be taken seriously. During the three months of London season he gave a succession of evening parties, which all had some definite _raison d’être_, chiefly musical. And to-night he had taken special pains to get all the right people, with the result that there were not perhaps a dozen people in London whose opinion was worth having who were not there. And the opinion, for once, was practically unanimous; for, though Claud Petman, plump and short-fingered, had something to say to Henry Runton about the lack of finality in the determination of his key-colour, and Henry Runton, over ortolans, agreed with the additional criticism that his phrasing of the fourth variation was a little pulpy, yet the fact that they were critics rendered it obligatory on them to criticise. But they had but small opportunity to express these fine differences of opinion to Martin himself, for Lady Sunningdale, on the conclusion of the prelude, beckoned imperatively to her “monster,” and made a brilliant group round him. She had taken it into her head that she had “discovered” Martin, and told every one so.