He had only that moment rolled out of bed, and was crumpled all over, hardly awake yet. His fair dank hair which no longer had any tendency to curl, lay in ruffled swathes about his head, and Joanna was shocked by the dullness of his eyes with their blinking, puffed lids. How little she had looked at Linnet lately! What was he doing with himself? Where did his life lie? He seemed to have so little part in the life at home. But at this moment Georgie’s arrival took precedence of all these questions, and the brother and sister having exchanged a hurried, nervous glance, started a race down the remaining flight of stairs. Pell-mell and laughing they went, taking two steps at a time, and they arrived together panting just as Georgie threw down her luggage on the lobby floor.

After the first impulsive hugs, the three stood chatting, overwhelmed by a sudden shyness and uncertainty.

Joanna took an overcoat of Linnet’s from the hat-stand and pulled it on over her chemise, snuggling into it with a shiver for the early morning air was fresh.

“No! Sholto hadn’t come yet… His train was due in about half an hour. – Wouldn’t Georgie like a bath?… Had she slept at all on the journey? – Surely that was a new hat she was wearing? – But since when had she taken to veils? – Carl Nilsson said veils were so bad for the eyes, especially veils with spots like that. – But how well Georgie was looking. And Georgie declared that Joanna with her pig-tail and the loose, short-skirted, tweed coat, looked just as she used to look at school.

“But, Linnet, my dear boy, you look awful!” exclaimed Georgie turning to her brother and pushing the spotted veil farther off her eyes. “What’s wrong with him, Joanna?” (Georgie had that wounding habit of involving a third person, a sort of dumb partner, in her adverse criticisms.)

“Haven’t shaved, that’s all,” mumbled Linnet, putting his hand up to his face defensively. “Think I’ll go and have a wash now.” And he moved away from them and towards the stair-case.

“I hope you don’t look like that every morning when you get up. Does he, Joey?” Georgie called out after him in high good-humour. But just as she was about to hurl another elder-sisterly gibe, advising Linnet to eschew all shades of mauve in his night attire, a wail of distress came from the landing above.

All three young people turned up their faces.

It was their mother. She leaned, in her thick, iron-grey dressing gown, over the bannister opposite her bedroom door, and was covering the top of her head with both her hands. By her voice they knew she was almost weeping.