"Meanwhile," she was writing, "I must ask you to accept my small enclosure, and to believe me to be, Yours with sincere regard, Jane Marsden-Thompson."
Then she sealed the envelope, rang a bell, and told someone to despatch her letter by registered post.
Fentiman had mopped up a lot of time—but no matter. Nevertheless, she moved with quick footsteps as she went from the room, and passed along the lofty, silent corridors. Presently using a master-key, she opened a fire-proof door, and entered a narrow passage. In this passage the silence was broken by a vague murmuring sound—like the ripple of sea waves heard echoing in a shell.
She opened another door, and immediately the sound swelled to a confused roar. Through this second door she had come out into a circular gallery just beneath the huge concave of the dome. Looking downward, she could see the extraordinary inverted perspective of circles, floor below floor, each circle apparently smaller than the one above; she could see long strands of gauze and lace, artfully festooned in void space from the gilt rails of the Curtain department, like streamers of white cloud; and beneath the pretty cloud she could see the rainbow colours of delicate satins and silks; and still lower she could see the stir of multitudinous life concentrating at this focal point of the busy shop.
But she scarcely looked: she listened. Perched high in her dome, solitary, motionless, august, she was like the queen-bee in the upper part of a hive attentively listening to the buzz of industry. And it seemed that the sound was sufficient: her instinct was so fine—she knew by the quality of the humming note that Bence's was working well.
XXXI
All well at Bence's; and all well at home.
It was pleasant to her, returning from her work on summer evenings, to see the white gates and long wall speed towards her: as if coming once again out of the land of dreams into the realm of facts, because she called them to her. She had wished for them, and they were hers. While her car glided from the gates to the porch, she enjoyed the full sight of the things that, seen in glimpses, soothed her eyes so many years ago—the comfortable eaves and latticed windows, the dark masses of foliage casting restful shadows on the sun-lit lawns, the steps and brickwork of the terraced garden giving value and form to the gay exuberance of the summer flowers.