Leaning back in a marqueterie chair and gazing down his uplifted nose at the sky-blue walls plastered with gold frames, he was noticeably silent.

Whether because he had been to a funeral or not, the peculiar Forsyte build of his face was seen to the best advantage this afternoon--a face concave and long, with a jaw which divested of flesh would have seemed extravagant: altogether a chinny face though not at all ill-looking.

He was feeling more strongly than ever that Timothy's was hopelessly 'rum-ti-too' and the souls of his aunts dismally mid-Victorian.

The subject on which alone he wanted to talk--his own undivorced position--was unspeakable.

And yet it occupied his mind to the exclusion of all else.