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 “Where are the sunsets now?” she repeated. “Do you find sunsets now, Mr. Popham?”

“I live at Highgate,” he replied.

“At Highgate? Yes, Highgate has its charms; your Uncle John lived at Highgate,” she jerked in the direction of Katharine. She sank her head upon her breast, as if for a moment’s meditation, which past, she looked up and observed: “I dare say there are very pretty lanes in Highgate. I can recollect walking with your mother, Katharine, through lanes blossoming with wild hawthorn. But where is the hawthorn now? You remember that exquisite description in De Quincey, Mr. Popham?—but I forget, you, in your generation, with all your activity and enlightenment, at which I can only marvel”—here she displayed both her beautiful white hands—“do not read De Quincey. You have your Belloc, your Chesterton, your Bernard Shaw—why should you read De Quincey?”

“But I do read De Quincey,” Ralph protested, “more than Belloc and Chesterton, anyhow.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed Mrs. Cosham, with a gesture of surprise and relief mingled. “You are, then, a rara avis in your generation. I am delighted to meet any one who reads De Quincey.”

Here she hollowed her hand into a screen, and, leaning towards Katharine, inquired, in a very audible whisper, “Does your friend write?”

“Mr. Denham,” said Katharine, with more than her usual clearness and firmness, “writes for the Review. He is a lawyer.”

“The clean-shaven lips, showing the expression of the mouth! I recognized them at once. I always feel at home with lawyers, Mr. Denham”

“They used to come about us so much in the old days,” Mrs. Milvain interposed, the frail, silvery notes of her voice falling with the sweet tone of an old bell.