Many bargains had he picked up there.
Even during those seven years at Brighton after Bosinney's death and Irene's flight, he had bought treasures there sometimes, though he had no place to put them; for when the conviction that his wife had gone for good at last became firm within him, he had caused a board to be put up in Montpellier Square: FOR SALE THE LEASE OF THIS DESIRABLE RESIDENCE Enquire of Messrs.

Lesson and Tukes, Court Street, Belgravia.
It had sold within a week--that desirable residence, in the shadow of whose perfection a man and a woman had eaten their hearts out.
Of a misty January evening, just before the board was taken down, Soames had gone there once more, and stood against the Square railings, looking at its unlighted windows, chewing the cud of possessive memories which had turned so bitter in the mouth.

Why had she never loved him?
Why?
She had been given all she had wanted, and in return had given him, for three long years, all he had wanted--except, indeed, her heart.

He had uttered a little involuntary groan, and a passing policeman had glanced suspiciously at him who no longer possessed the right to enter that green door with the carved brass knocker beneath the board 'For Sale!' A choking sensation had attacked his throat, and he had hurried away into the mist.

That evening he had gone to Brighton to live....
Approaching Malta Street, Soho, and the Restaurant Bretagne, where Annette would be drooping her pretty shoulders over her accounts, Soames thought with wonder of those seven years at Brighton.