Before she came Isabel spoke of her to Ralph, who was standing before the fireplace. ‘Pray who is this Madame Merle?’

‘The cleverest woman I know, not excepting yourself,’ said Ralph.

‘I thought she seemed very pleasant.’

‘I was sure you’d think her very pleasant.’

‘Is that why you invited her?’

‘I didn’t invite her, and when we came back from London I didn’t know she was here. No one invited her. She’s a friend of my mother’s, and just after you and I went to town my mother got a note from her. She had arrived in England (she usually lives abroad, though she has first and last spent a good deal of time here), and asked leave to come down for a few days. She’s a woman who can make such proposals with perfect confidence; she’s so welcome wherever she goes. And with my mother there could be no question of hesitating; she’s the one person in the world whom my mother very much admires. If she were not herself (which she after all much prefers), she would like to be Madame Merle. It would indeed be a great change.’

‘Well, she’s very charming,’ said Isabel. ‘And she plays beautifully.’

‘She does everything beautifully. She’s complete.’

Isabel looked at her cousin a moment. ‘You don’t like her.’

‘On the contrary, I was once in love with her.’

‘And she didn’t care for you, and that’s why you don’t like her.’

‘How can we have discussed such things? Monsieur Merle was then living.’

‘Is he dead now?’

‘So she says.’

‘Don’t you believe her?’

‘Yes, because the statement agrees with the probabilities. The husband of Madame Merle would be likely to pass away.’

Isabel gazed at her cousin again. ‘I don’t know what you mean. You mean something—that you don’t mean. What was Monsieur Merle?’

‘The husband of Madame.’

‘You’re very odious. Has she any children?’

‘Not the least little child—fortunately.’

‘Fortunately?’

‘I mean fortunately for the child. She’d be sure to spoil it.’

Isabel was apparently on the point of assuring her cousin for the third time that he was odious; but the discussion was interrupted by the arrival of the lady who was the topic of it. She came rustling in quickly, apologizing for being late, fastening a bracelet, dressed in dark blue satin, which exposed a white bosom