DARK HESTER
‘Don’t call her. I will wait till she comes in,’ said Monica, and Bowditt showed her into the drawing-room.
Celia’s drawing-room was china-blue and white and grey, with touches of lemon colour in the Iceland poppies set upon the mantelpiece and of black in the cushions and picture frames. Monica went to the fireplace where, because of Celia, a little knot of flame glimmered pleasantly, and looked about her, seeing her own figure reflected in the old French mirror on the other side of the room, a thickened yet youthful form in pleated short grey skirt, short jacket, and black straw hat with a velvet bow. Her figure went with the room and it seemed to her that the room belonged more to her own past than to Celia’s. The mezzotints from Reynolds and Gainsborough had been given to Celia’s father and mother as a wedding-gift from her parents. She remembered the delicate Chippendale chairs in Celia’s grandmother’s drawing-room and playing as a child round the old Chesterfield, now covered in blue and white cretonne. This was the sort of room she understood and loved; that understood and loved her: here she was herself, her petals all unfolded.
Norah came trudging in almost at once, drawing off her muddy gloves, a pleasant-faced young wo-
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