Esther had seen George’s gesture and wondered what it meant. She disengaged herself from the people to whom she had been talking and came over to him, a frown of tender solicitude on her face.

“Darling,” she said eagerly, taking his hand and looking at him earnestly, “how are you getting along? Are you all right?”

In his confusion and anguish he could not answer her for a moment, and when he did, the guilty knowledge of the decision he had just arrived at made him lash out angrily as though in self-defence.

“Who said I wasn’t all right?” he demanded harshly. “Why shouldn’t I be?” And, instantly, seeing her gentle face, he was filled with baffled and furious regret.

“Oh, all right, all right,” she said hastily and placatingly. “I just wanted to know if — are you having a good time?” she said, with a little forced smile. “Don’t you think it’s a nice party — hah? You want to meet anyone? You must know some of the people here.”

Before he had a chance to say anything more Lily Mandell came weaving through the crowded room to Mrs. Jack’s side.

“0 Esther, darling,” she said in a drowsy tone, “I wonder if you’ve heard —” Seeing the young man, she paused. “Oh, hello. I didn’t know you were here.” There was a note of protest in her voice.

These two had met before, but only casually. They shook hands. And all at once Mrs. Jack’s face was glowing with happiness. She put her own hands in a firm clasp upon those of the man and woman, and whispered:

“My two. Two of the people that I love best in the whole world. You must know and love each other as I do you.”

In the grip of her deep emotion she fell silent, while the other two remained clumsily holding hands. After a moment, awkwardly, they let their hands drop to their sides and stood ill at ease, looking at each other.

Just then Mr. Lawrence Hirsch sauntered up. He was calm and assured, and did not seem to be following anyone. His hands in he trouser pockets of his evening clothes, a man fashionably at ease, urbanely social, a casual ambler from group to group in this brilliant gathering, informed, alert, suave, polished, cool, detached — he was the very model of what a great captain of finance, letters, arts, and enlightened principles should be.

“0 Esther,” he said, “I must tell you what we have found out about the case.” The tone was matter-of-fact and undisturbed, carrying the authority of calm conviction. “Two innocent men were put to death. At last we have positive proof of it — evidence that was never allowed to come to light. It proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that Vanzetti could not have been within fifty miles of the crime.”

Mr. Hirsch spoke quietly, and did not look at Miss Mandell.

“But how horrible!” cried Mrs. Jack, righteous anger blazing up in her as she turned to Mr. Hirsch. “Isn’t it dreadful to know that such things can happen in a country like this! It’s the most damnable thing I ever heard of!”

For the first time, now, Mr. Hirsch turned to Miss Mandell, casually, as if he had only just become aware of her presence. “Yes, isn’t it?” he said, including her with charming yet not over-zealous intimacy within the range of his quiet enthusiasm. “Don’t you think —?”

Miss Mandell did not actually step on him. She just surveyed him slowly, with a smouldering look of loathing. “What!” she said. Then to Mrs. Jack: “Really! I simply can’t —” She shrugged helplessly, despairingly, and moved away, a miracle of sensual undulance.

And Mr. Hirsch — he did not follow her, not even with a glance. Nor did he show by so much as the flicker of a lash that he had seen or heard or noticed anything. He went on talking in his well-modulated tones to Mrs. Jack.

In the middle of what he was saying, suddenly he noticed George Webber. “Oh, hello,” he said. “How are you?” He detached one hand from his elegant pocket and for a moment bestowed it on the young man, then turned back again to Mrs. Jack, who was still burning with hot indignation over what she had heard.

“These miserable people who could be guilty of such a thing!” she exclaimed. “These despicable, horrible, rich people! It’s enough to make you want a revolution!” she cried.

“Well, my dear,” said Mr. Hirsch with cool irony, “you may have your wish gratified. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility. And if it comes, that case may still return to plague them yet. The trials, of course, were perfectly outrageous, and the judge should have been instantly dismissed.”

“To think that there are people living who could do a thing like that!” cried Mrs. Jack. “You know,” she went on earnestly and somewhat irrelevantly, “I have always been a Socialist. I voted for Norman Thomas. You see,” she spoke very simply and with honest self-respect, “I’ve always been a worker. All my sympathy is on their side.”

Mr. Hirsch’s manner had become a trifle vague, detached, as if he were no longer paying strict attention. “It is a cause célèbre,” he said, and, seeming to like the sound of the words, he repeated them portentously: “A cause célèbre.”

Then, distinguished, polished, and contained, with casual hands loose-pocketed beneath his tails, he sauntered on. He moved off in the general direction of Miss Mandell. And yet he did not seem to follow her.

For Mr. Lawrence Hirsch was wounded sorrowfully. But he could wait.

“Oh, Beddoes! Beddoes!”

At these strange words, so exultantly spoken that they rang round the walls of the great room, people halted in the animation of their talk with one another and, somewhat startled, looked in the direction from which the sounds had proceeded.

“Oh, Beddoes by all means!” the voice cried even more exuberantly than before. “Hah-hah-hah! Beddoes!”— there was gloating in the laugh. “Everyone must, of course, they simply must!”

The speaker was Mr. Samuel Fetzer. He was not only an old friend of Mrs. Jack’s, but apparently he was also a familiar of many of the people there, because when they saw who it was they smiled at one another and murmured: “Oh, it’s Sam,” as if that explained everything.

In the world to which he belonged Mr. Samuel Fetzer was known as “the book-lover” par excellence. His very appearance suggested it. One needed only to look at him to know that he was an epicure, a taster of fine letters, a collector and connoisseur of rare editions. One could see with half an eye that he was the kind of fellow you might expect to find on a rainy afternoon in a musty old bookshop, peering and poking and prowling round the stacks with a soft, cherubic glow on his ruddy features, and occasionally fingering with a loving hand some tattered old volume. He made one think somehow of a charming thatched cottage in the English countryside — of a pipe, a shaggy dog, a comfortable chair, a warm nook by the blazing fire, and an old book and a crusty bottle — a bottle of old port! In fact, the exultant way in which he now pronounced the syllables of “Beddoes!” suggested a bottle of old port. He fairly smacked his lips over the word, as if he had just poured himself a glass of the oldest and rarest vintage and taken his first appraising sip.

His whole appearance confirmed this impression of him. His pleasant, sensitive, glowing face, which wore a constant air of cherubic elation, and his high bald forehead were healthily browned and weathered as if he spent much time tramping in the open air. And, in contrast to the other guests, who were all in formal evening dress, he had on tan, thick-soled English walking shoes, woollen socks, grey flannel trousers, a trifle baggy but fashionably Oxonian, a tweed coat of brownish texture, a soft white shirt, and a red tie. One would have said, at sight of him, that he must have just come in from a long walk across the moors, and that now, pleasantly tired, he was looking forward with easeful contemplation to an evening spent with his dog, beside his fire, with a bottle of old port, and Beddoes. One would never have guessed the truth — that he was an eminent theatrical director whose life since childhood had been sp............