Brun gave himself a whisky-and-soda. "No idea you were such a talker, Christopher.... But I'm right all the same." He held up his glass. "Here's to the Tiger in the next generation." He drank, then held it up again. "And here," he cried, "to the memory of the last Great lady in England!" III When Brim had gone it seemed that he had left that last toast of his in the air behind him. Christopher was haunted by the thought of the Duchess, he felt her with him in the room; she stirred him to restlessness so that at last, desperately, he took his hat and went out. His steps took him, round the corner, to Portland Place; here all was very quiet, a few cabs in the middle of the street, a few lights in the windows, the silver field of stars, in the distance the sky golden, fired now and again into life as a rocket rose shielding beneath its glow all that stirring multitude. Sounds rose--a cry, a shout, singing--then died down again. He was outside No. 104. He thought that he would ring and see whether Mrs. Newton were in; perhaps she had gone to bed, it was after eleven, but, if she were there, he would take one last look at the Portrait before it was packed up and sent down to Beaminster. Mrs. Newton unbolted the door and smiled when she saw him--"I was just going to bed--There's only myself and Louisa here--and the watchman." "I won't keep you, Mrs. Newton," he said. "The fancy just took me to look at some of the pictures once more before they're packed up. Lady Seddon told me that a good many of them were to be packed up to-morrow; they won't look quite the same at Beaminster." "No, that they won't, sir," said Mrs. Newton. "I shall miss the old house. Just to think of the years; and now, all of us scattered!" She lit a lamp for him and he went up the stone staircase, found the long drawing-room, and there, on the farther wall, the Portrait. The furniture, shrouded in brown holland, waited like ghostly watchers on every side of him. The huge house, always a place of strange silences and vast disturbances, multiplied now in its long mirrors and its air of cold suspense as though it were waiting for something to happen, showed its recognition of death and death's consequences. But the Portrait was alive! As he held the lamp up to it the face leapt into agitation, the eyes were bent once again sharply upon him, the mouth curved to speak, the black silk rustled against the chair. A host of memories crowded the room, he was filled with a regret more poignant than anything that he had felt since her death. "She _was_ fine! I miss her more than I had any notion that I would! She stirred one up, she made one alive!" He put the lamp upon the floor and sat down for a minute amongst the shrouded furniture.