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RV 279 the night he had made her give up the Rivington dinner. But her dream had not survived that evening. She had understood then that he meant they should be "only friends"; that was all the future was to hold for her. Well; for a grand-mother it ought to be enough. She had no patience with the silly old women who expected "that sort of nonsense" to last. Still, she meant, on her return to town, to consult a new Russian who had invented a radium treatment which absolutely wiped out wrinkles. He called himself a Scientific Initiate the name fascinated her.

From these perplexities she was luckily distracted by the urgent business of the Cardinal's reception. Even without Maisie she could do a good deal of preparatory writing and telephoning; but she was mortified to find how much her handwriting had suffered from the long habit of dictation. She never wrote a note in her own hand nowadays—except to distinguished foreigners, since Amalasuntha had explained that they thought typed communications ill-bred. And her unpractised script was so stiff and yet slovenly that she decided she must have her hands "treated" as she did her other unemployed muscles. But how find time for this new and indispensable cure? Her spirits rose with the invigorating sense of being once more in a hurry

Nona sat on the south terrace in the sun. The Cedarledge experiment had lasted eight days now,