How the fragrance of the cigarette stood out upon the fresh warm air ... that was perique, that curious strong flavour. They were very strong, he had said so; but downstairs, talking like that they had had no particular flavour, just cigarettes, bringing the cigarette mood ... no wonder he had been surprised, really surprised, at her smoking so many ... but then he had been surprised at her eating a hard apple at midnight ... the sitting room had suddenly looked familiar going into it alone while they were seeing out the Pinners and the big man. Strange unknown voices that perhaps she would not hear again, going out into the night ... their voices jesting the last jests as the guests went down the garden, sounding in the hall, familiar and homely, well known to her, presently coming back into the sitting room; the fire burning brightly like any other fire, the exciting deep pinkness of the shaded lamplight like nothing else in the world. Alma knew it, rushing in ... whirling about with Alma in that room with that afternoon left in it; the sounds of bolting and locking coming in from the hall. 10 ... "You looked extraordinarily pretty...." "You have come through it all remarkably well" ... remarkable had a k in it in English, and German, merkwürdig, and perhaps in Scandinavian languages; but not in other languages; it was one of the things that separated England from the south ... remarkable ... hard and chilly. "You know you're awfully good stuff. You've had an extraordinary variety of experience; you've got your freedom; you ought to write." "That is what a palmist told me at Newlands. It was at a big afternoon 'at home'; there was a palmist in a little dark room sitting near a lamp; she looked at nothing but your hands; she kept saying whatever you do, write. If you haven't written yet, write, if you don't succeed go on writing." "Just so, have you written?" "Ah, but she also told me my self-confidence had been broken; that I used to be self-confident and was so no longer. It's true." "Have you written anything?" "I once sent in a thing to Home Notes. They sent it back but asked me to write something else and suggested a few things." "If they had taken your stuff you would have gone on and learnt to turn out stuff bad enough for Home Notes and gone on doing it for the rest of your life." "But then an artist, a woman who had a studio in Bond Street and knew Leighton, saw some things I had tried to paint and said I ought to make any sacrifice to learn painting, and a musician said the same about music." "You could work in writing quite well with your present work." ... "Pieces of short prose; anything; a description of an old woman sitting in an omnibus ... anything. There's plenty of room for good work. There's the Academy always ready to consider well-written pieces of short prose. Write something and send it to me."