All of which amused Grace Ferrall infinitely until the subtler significance of the girl's mental processes struck her, sobering her own thoughts.

Sylvia, too, had grown serious in her preoccupation; and the partie-a-deux terminated a few minutes later in a duet of silence over the tea-cups in the gun-room.
The weather had turned warm and misty; one of those sudden sea-coast changes had greyed the blue in the sky, spreading a fine haze over land and water, effacing the crisp sparkle of the sea, dulling the westering sun.
A few moments later Sylvia, glancing over her shoulder, noticed that a fine misty drizzle had clouded the casements.

That meant that her usual evening stroll on the cliffs with Quarrier, before dressing for dinner, was off.

And she drew a little breath of unconscious relief as Marion Page walked in, her light woollen shooting-jacket, her hat, shoes, and the barrels of the fowling-piece tucked under her left arm-pit, all glimmering frostily with powdered rain drops.
She said something to Grace Ferrall about the mist promising good point-shooting in the morning, took the order book from a servant, jotted down her request to be called an hour before sunrise, filled in the gun-room records with her score--the species and number bagged, and the number of shells used--and accepting the tea offered, drew out a tiny cigarette-case of sweet-bay wood heavily crusted with rose-gold.
"With whom were you shooting ?" asked Grace, as Marion dropped one well-shaped leg over the other and wreathed her delicately tanned features in smoke.
"Stephen Siward and Blinky.

They're at it yet, but I had some letters to write." She glanced leisurely at Sylvia and touched the ash-tray with the whitening end of her cigarette.