reclining below them with his chin on his hand and his elbow on a red velvet cushion, on the Japanese cabinet; the Japanese cupboard fixed above Mrs. Orly's writing table, the fine firm carved ivory on its panels; the tall vase of Cape gooseberries flaring on the top of the cottage piano under the shadow of the gallery; the gallery with its upper mystery, the happy clock fastened against its lower edge, always at something after four, the door set back in the wall, leading into her far-away midday room, the light falling from the long high frosted window along the confusion of Mr. Orly's bench, noisy as she looked at it with the sound of metal tools falling with a rattle, the drone and rattle of the motor lathe, Mr. Orly's cheerful hummings and whistlings, the bench swept down the length of the room to her side ... the movable shaded electric lamp; Mr. Orly's African tobacco pouch bunched underneath it on the edge of the bench near the old leather armchair near to the fire, facing the assegais; the glass-doored bookcase on either side of the fireplace, the strange smooth gold on the strips of Burmese wood fastened along the shelves, the clear brown light of the room on the gold, the curious lettering sweeping across the gold. "Tea? Good." Mr. Leyton pulled up a chair and plumped into it digging at his person and dragging out the tails of his coat with one hand, holding a rumpled newspaper at reading length. When his coat-tails were free he scratched his head and scrubbed vigorously at his short brown beard. "You had tea?" he said to Miriam's motionlessness, without looking up. "No--let's have tea," said Miriam. Why should he assume that she should pour out the tea.... "I _say_ that's a _nasty_ one" said Mr. Leyton hysterically and began reading in a high hysterical falsetto.