The dinner was delightful, well cooked, daintily served, and leisurely eaten. A red-shaded lamp threw a rosy light on the white cloth, the glittering crystal and bright silver. The number of diners was less than the Muses, and more than the Graces, and everyone laid himself or herself out to make things bright. And again Maud Krill may be mentioned as an exception. She ate well and held her tongue, merely smiling heavily when addressed. Paul, glancing at her serene face across the rosy-hued table, wondered if she really was as calm as she looked, and if she really lacked the brain power her mother seemed to possess. "I am glad to see you here, Beecot," said Hay, smiling. "I am very glad to be here," said Paul, adapting himself to circumstances, "especially in such pleasant company." "You don't go out much," said Lord George. "No, I am a poor author who has yet to win his spurs." "I thought of being an author myself," said the young man, "but it was such a fag to think about things." "You want your material supplied to you perhaps," put in Mrs. Krill in a calm, contemptuous way. "Oh, no! If I wrote stories like the author johnnies I'd rake up my family history. There's lots of fun there." "Your family mightn't like it," giggled Miss Qian. "I know lots of things about my own people which would read delightfully if Mr. Beecot set them down, but then--" she shrugged her dainty shoulders, "oh, dear me, what a row there would be!" "I suppose there is a skeleton in every cupboard," said Hay, suavely, and quite ignoring the shady tenant in his own. "There's a whole dozen cupboards with skeletons to match in my family," said the young lord. "Why, I had an aunt, Lady Rachel Sandal, who was murdered over twenty years ago. Now," he said, looking triumphantly round the table, "which of you can say there's a murder in your family--eh, ladies and gentlemen?" Paul glanced sideways at Mrs. Krill, wondering what she would say, and wondering also how it was that Lord George did not know she was the widow of the murdered Lemuel Krill, whose name had been so widely advertised. But Hay spoke before anyone could make a remark. "What an unpleasant subject," he said, with a pretended shudder, "let us talk of less melodramatic things." "Oh, why," said Mrs. Krill, using her fan. "I rather like to hear about murders." Lord George looked oddly at her, and seemed about to speak. Paul thought for the moment that he did know about the Gwynne Street crime and intended to remark thereon. But if so his good taste told him that he would be ill-advised to speak and he turned to ask for another glass of wine. Miss Aurora Qian looked in her pretty shrewd way from one to the other. "I just love the Newgate Calendar," she said, clasping her hands. "There's lovely plots for dramas to be found there. Don't you think so, Mr. Beecot?" "I don't read that sort of literature, Miss Qian." "Ah, then you don't know what people are capable of in the way of cruelty, Mr. Beecot."