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The letter had appeared extraordinary in its effrontery, for it said nothing. Beyond the bare statement, 'I am now ready to return to you,' it occupied itself simply with the fact that Mrs Tietjens wanted--could no longer get on without--the services of her maid, whom she called Hullo Central. If Tietjens wanted her, Mrs Tietjens, to return to him he was to see that Hullo Central was waiting on the doorstep for her, and so on. She added the detail that there was no one else, underlined, she could bear round her while she was retiring for the night. On reflection Macmaster could see that this was the best letter the woman could have written if she wanted to be taken back; for, had she extended herself into either excuses or explanations, it was ten chances to one Tietjens would have taken the line that he couldn't go on living with a woman capable of such a lapse in taste. But Macniaster had never thought of Sylvia as wanting in savoir faire.

It had, none the less, hardened him in his determination to urge his friend to divorce. He had intended to begin this campaign in the fly, driving to pay his call on the Rev. Mr Duchemin, who; in early life, had been a personal disciple of Mr Ruskin and a patron and acquaintance of the poet-painter, the subject of Macmaster's monograph. On this drive Tietjens preferred not to come. He said that he would loaf about the town and meet Macmaster at the golf club towards four-thirty. He was not in the mood for making new acquaintances. Macmaster, who knew the pressure under which his friend must be suffering, thought this reasonable enough, and drove off up Iden Hill by himself.