Madame Vervier rearranged the tray, setting the tongs on the sugar, the strainer on a cup, placing the plate of _madeleines_ here, the _brioches_ there; all mildly, with no savour of criticism for Albertine’s haphazard methods. In England such a ministrant at the tea-table would have been felt as a flaw on the prevailing perfection; yet Albertine, Giles divined, was also the cook; and a bevy of trim, capped English maids could hardly have evolved the lustre of cleanliness that reigned throughout the lovely little house. It was difficult to think of madame Vervier as poor; and more difficult to think of her doing things for herself. Yet all the loveliness had, he felt, been gathered together with something of the same mild dexterity that now brought order and comeliness to the tea-table. Madame Vervier was the sort of person who would pick up lovely things for a song; the Louis Quinze bedstead, the _voile de Gênes_, the tall cream-white _cafetière_, like one he had seen in a picture by—Chardin, wasn’t it?—and the teapot with a delicate spray of grey flowers, just touched with gilt, on its side—had all, he could imagine, been brought to her nest by the unerring instinct that leads the bird to select the white feather or the lichen. Alix had said, he remembered, that part of their revenue was derived from the rent of the fairy-tale house; he was sure that it was an investment that paid well. And she had probably herself made the dresses she and Alix wore. She could be extravagant if the money were there; if it were not, she was careful. One felt in her the essential freedom from material bondage. Monsieur de Maubert was still in his shady corner with the _Nouvelle Revue Française_ on his knee. The young artist had reappeared and was sitting on the steps, his chin on his hands, looking out at the sea. Madame Vervier took her place at the tea-table, monsieur de Maubert drew his chair beside her, and Giles’s friend strolled up from the cliff-path accompanied by yet another noticeable personage.