“I think I’d like some,” Mark said miserably and followed her trailing, white skirts down an endless garden. He thought her gown distinctly bad and sloppy. She must be older than she looked or she wouldn’t be so careless. The girdle was crooked and the gauze across her shoulders was too tight. But it was a fine body, tall and proportionate. Her hair was a lustreless black. Meanwhile he had to think about this scene of an English garden. It phrased itself simply. Wall, rear. Tower of church, right background. Two small children playing with a kitten. Tea-table. Three ladies. Young man in tweeds. One clergyman.--It was like the garden set for the “Princess of Croy.” Mark braced himself, bowed and murmured in the manner of Mrs. LeMoyne, leaned on one of the limes in the manner of Herbert Kelcey, and drank his tea in the manner of Mr. Drew. The minor canon gave him a cigarette and Mark said, “Thanks so much.” The youth in tweeds asserted that it was beastly hot for June and Mark admitted, “Rather.” He stood sombre against the lime and the group was chilled by his chill. Two of the ladies fancied him a poet by the red curling of his hair. The guests withdrew. Olive Ilden fiddled with a teaspoon and frowned. “I rather expected you on Tuesday.” “Had to stay in London. Mr. Carlson wanted me to look at a couple of plays he’s thinkin’ of bringing over.” “Really, I don’t see why you Yankees always import our nonsense. One hears of the Pinero rubbish playing for thousands of nights in the States. Why?” “The women like it,” he wildly said, quoting Carlson. “Are those your kids?” “Mine and my husband’s,” Olive laughed and called Joan and Robert Ilden from their game with the kitten. Mark played with them in all content for half an hour, didn’t glance at Olive, and told her blond children about his best nephew, Gurdy Bernamer. The bored infants broke his watch chain and their puzzled mother took Mark to walk. She led him down through the college and wondered why he paused to stare at the cathedral walls where the sunshine was pallid on the weathered stone.--He was thinking that bulbs tinted straw colour might get this glow against properly painted canvas.--His eyes opened and his drowsy gaze pleased the woman. She said, “Do you like it? The cathedral?” “The tower’s too small,” he said. “Clever of you. Yes, architects think so. Glad you noticed.” “Anybody could see that. Is that the Bishop?” he asked, seeing black gaiters in motion on a lawn. “A mere dean. And the birds are rooks. All the best cathedrals have rooks about. Shall we go in?” “I’d just as soon,” he nodded, regretting that the queer shade of the elms wasn’t possible on a backdrop.