On the mahogany
sideboard reposed a cruet-stand and a green dish of very red apples.
A bamboo-framed talc screen painted with white and yellow marguerites
stood before a fireplace filled with pampas-grass dyed red. The chairs
were of red morocco, the curtains a brownish-red, the walls green, and
on them hung a set of Landseer prints. The peculiar sensation which red
and green in juxtaposition produce on the sensitive was added to Gyp's
distress. And, suddenly, her eyes lighted on a little deep-blue china
bowl. It stood on a black stand on the mantel-piece, with nothing in it.
To Gyp, in this room of red and green, with the smell of mutton creeping
in, that bowl was like the crystallized whiff of another world. Daphne
Wing--not Daisy Wagge--had surely put it there! And, somehow, it touched
her--emblem of stifled beauty, emblem of all that the girl had tried to
pour out to her that August afternoon in her garden nearly a year ago.
Thin Eastern china, good and really beautiful! A wonder they allowed it
to pollute this room!
A sigh made her turn round. With her back against the door and a white,
scared face, the girl was standing. Gyp thought: 'She has suffered
horribly.' And, going impulsively up to her, she held out her hand.
Daphne Wing sighed out: "Oh, Mrs. Fiorsen!" and, bending over that hand,
kissed it. Gyp saw that her new glove was wet.
Pages:
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202