"I like this," said Humphrey, touching another old chair.
"Ah! yes, that's a beauty," Wratten replied. "I picked that up in Ipswich frightfully cheap. It's an old Dutch back chair of the seventeenth century." He tilted it up and ran his palm over the perfect curve of the cabriole legs, entirely absorbed in the pleasure of touching the chair.
"I didn't know you went in for this sort of thing," Humphrey said.
"I've been getting things like this together for years ... they're so restful, these old things. Can you imagine anything more peaceful than that book-case?" and he pointed to a beautiful Empire book-case, with rows of books showing through the latticed glass and brass rosettes for handles to the drawers that rested on claw feet.
The change in Wratten was really remarkable. Although he was still serious, and his face in repose was gloomy, he seemed to have lost his brusque manner. Marriage had undoubtedly softened him.
Mrs Wratten came into the room and welcomed Humphrey. Wratten slipped his arm through his wife's, and she looked up at him and smiled at him.... Humphrey saw himself standing thus, in his own home, with Lilian close to him, his companion for ever. It all seemed so very desirable. This little home was very compact and peaceful, thousands of miles removed from the restlessness of Fleet Street....
While they were talking, a young man and a woman were ushered into the room by the little maid-servant. The likeness between the two was unmistakable—they were obviously brother and sister. The young man was the taller of the two, very slender, with the thin and delicate hands of a woman. Humphrey noticed the long fingers tapering to the well-kept nails. The face was the face of an ascetic, thin-lipped and refined. The eyes were peculiarly glowing, and set deeply beneath the overhanging eyebrows; the nose was finely chiselled; the nostrils sensitive and curling, with a faint suspicion of superciliousness. He was introduced to Humphrey as Kenneth Carr, and Humphrey knew the name at once. Kenneth Carr had the reputation of being a brilliant descriptive writer; he was on the staff of The Herald, but, besides that, he had written several historical biographies, many novels, and was at work on a play. He belonged to a type which is a little apart from Fleet Street, with its wear and tear—a shy, scholarly man, who found that historical biographies and novels did not yield sufficient income, and, therefore, the grinding work of everyday journalism was preferable to pot boiling. Fleet Street was, to him, a stepping-stone. He would have been happier in the editorial chair of a weekly paper, or writing essays for The Spectator and the Saturday Review, but, as it was, he threw in his lot with Fleet Street, and did his work so well that he stood at the top of the ladder. But Fleet Street had left its mark on his face—it was pale and thin, and the eyes had a strained, nervous look in them.
"Awfully good of you to ask us," he said to Mrs Wratten. "Elizabeth and I don't go out much, she gets so tired from her slumming."
His sister smiled—Humphrey saw that the handsome features of Kenneth Carr became beautiful in his sister's face. The sharp lines about the nose and mouth were softened, her eyes were bluer and larger, her face rounded more fully, and devoid of the hollows which made the face of Kenneth so intellectual. The likeness between brother and sister finished with the lips—hers were very red, and were faintly parted, so that one had a glimpse of her teeth, like a string of white pearls. She wore her hair in two loops from a parting in the centre, and she had a habit of carrying her head a little forward, so that the outward curve of her neck was emphasized in its perfect grace.