"Though suppose nobody ever does propose to me?" Mary thought. She turned round for reassurance from the large gilded mirror over the mantelpiece, and wished that she had never seen herself in a glass before, so that she could arrive at a decision about her beauty. Was she beautiful? If with six other girls she stood before a mirror for the first time, so that she did not know which was herself, should she think herself beautiful? But she should know which was herself, because she should recognize the other girls, and the stranger in the middle would be herself. "Oh, am I or am I not beautiful?" she asked aloud of her reflection, standing motionless in that frozen, reflected room where nothing was alive except the swift pendulum of the ormulu clock on the wall behind her. "Am I or am I not beautiful?" she repeated with a sigh, as she took her place once more by the window and gazed out at the black and white trees in the Park, beneath whose filigree of boughs people were wandering in couples upon the powdered grass, walking so slowly that they must be happy, Mary thought. She was filled with envy of those shadows beyond the railings, who could upon this cold January afternoon pace up and down with such unhurried steps. They surely must be lovers, who could find delight in this chill and somber air, who could stroll arm in arm about this landscape that was sinking beneath the weight of a leaden sky. There opposite, two shadows were actually sitting upon a bench, sitting as close as birds sit upon a perch at dusk. They must love each other very deeply and very dearly, to endure the cold, very deeply and very dearly to stay there away from the firelight. Beautiful firelight, Mary thought; and she watched for a while its diminished reflection lambent within the milky windowpanes. "_Miladi_ is awake, Mademoiselle," said Adèle, coming into the room. The canaries that lived in the domed conservatory at the back of the drawing-room began to sing. The depression of the long silence was broken. Mary ran up the cheerful gas-lit stairs to her grandmother. Lady Flower had tried to neutralize the fretwork of age by excess of lace. She was still ivory; but the ivory was scratched, here and there even badly cracked. The texture of lace seemed more likely than any other to distract the attention of the observer, to confuse him by its infinite reticulation and thus provide an illusive calendry for that wrinkled countenance of hers. "Well, dear," she began at once, sitting up among the pillows when Mary came into the room. "I slept much better than I expected after those grated chestnuts we had for your birthday lunch. I have an impression of dreaming a good deal, but I've forgotten what about. So much the better, for there is nobody so irritating as a _raconteur des rêves_."