They were just beneath the wide white facade, with its rich restraint of line, which suggested the clever corseting of a redundant figure. “That’s the next stage: the desire to imply that one has been to Europe, and has a standard. I’m sure Mrs. Bry thinks her house a copy of the TRIANON; in America every marble house with gilt furniture is thought to be a copy of the TRIANON. What a clever chap that architect is, though—how he takes his client’s measure! He has put the whole of Mrs. Bry in his use of the composite order. Now for the Trenors, you remember, he chose the Corinthian: exuberant, but based on the best precedent. The Trenor house is one of his best things—doesn’t look like a banqueting-hall turned inside out. I hear Mrs. Trenor wants to build out a new ball-room, and that divergence from Gus on that point keeps her at Bellomont. The dimensions of the Brys’ ball-room must rankle: you may be sure she knows ’em as well as if she’d been there last night with a yard-measure. Who said she was in town, by the way? That Farish boy? She isn’t, I know; Mrs. Stepney was right; the house is dark, you see: I suppose Gus lives in the back.” He had halted opposite the Trenors’ corner, and Selden perforce stayed his steps also. The house loomed obscure and uninhabited; only an oblong gleam above the door spoke of provisional occupancy. “They’ve bought the house at the back: it gives them a hundred and fifty feet in the side street. There’s where the ball-room’s to be, with a gallery connecting it: billiard-room and so on above. I suggested changing the entrance, and carrying the drawing-room across the whole Fifth Avenue front; you see the front door corresponds with the windows——” The walking-stick which Van Alstyne swung in demonstration dropped to a startled “Hallo!” as the door opened and two figures were seen silhouetted against the hall-light. At the same moment a hansom halted at the curb-stone, and one of the figures floated down to it in a haze of evening draperies; while the other, black and bulky, remained persistently projected against the light. For an immeasurable second the two spectators of the incident were silent; then the house-door closed, the hansom rolled off, and the whole scene slipped by as if with the turn of a stereopticon. Van Alstyne dropped his eye-glass with a low whistle. “A—hem—nothing of this, eh, Selden? As one of the family, I know I may count on you—appearances are deceptive—and Fifth Avenue is so imperfectly lighted——” “Goodnight,” said Selden, turning sharply down the side street without seeing the other’s extended hand. * * * * *