The yellow book: an illustrated quarterly (6.1895)

142

A New Poster

supposed to be in love with Dicky, and at having to endure his
conversation all the evening; while Adrian Marks, who was far older
and more interesting, dismissed her with a hand-shake and strolled
after Cynthia into the other room.
Adrian Marks himself was full of pleasing sensations. A
comfortable chair in a softly lighted, pretty room, and a clever
woman to talk to, represented his favourite form of diversion ; and
the gratifying suspicion of having piqued her slightly by his re-
missness in calling added a zest to the situation.
But he had read the will at Somerset House, and he did not
mean it to be more than a pleasant evening.
“Do you mind the window being open ? It is hot in here,
and besides, I like to see the trees in the square—don’t you r ”
said Cynthia, settling herself in the low window-seat.
“ I like anything that affords an excuse for a good pose,” he
said, and looked at her and not at the trees.
It was a favourable opening, and Mrs. Angelo Milton followed
it up well. She had her own game to play this evening, and she
was going to stake her happiness to win it. All the thraldom of
her American life, all its sordidness and its gilded opulence, lay
clearly before her mind and tortured her with its vividness ;
it only needed a decided action on her part to put it away
from her for ever. And the man who could save her
from its haunting memories was Adrian, whom she thought
she loved sufficiently to marry because she had felt hurt
when he neglected her. She knew he loved her too in
his narrow, selfish way. And she felt tolerably sure she could
win him if she tried ; and, ignoble process though it was, she did
try.
“You have been out of town r” she asked him when they had
touched on various indifferent topics.

“ Since