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Updated: June 19, 2025
"It is a long time since you were in England," she remarked after the first interchange of civilities. "Very long," agreed Quarrington politely. "It would probably have been still longer if Lady Arabella had not tempted me. But her portrait was too interesting a commission to refuse." "It sounds banal to say how good I think it. You never paint anything that isn't good, do you?"
It had been what Magda called a "blue day" the sky overhead a deep unbroken azure, the dimpling, dancing waters of the Solent flinging back a blue almost as vivid and she and Quarrington had put out from Netherway harbour in the morning and crossed to Cowes.
"We men will never understand women," he said. "There's an angel hidden away somewhere in every one of you." His mouth curved into a smile, half-sad, half-whimsical. "I've just found Magda's." Lady Arabella and Gillian, both feeling rather like conspirators, waited anxiously for a reply to the former's letter to Quarrington. But none came.
He offered his arm and Magda, dismissing her little court of disgruntled admirers with a small gracious nod, laid her slim hand on his sleeve. As they moved away together the orchestra broke into the swinging seductive rhythm of a waltz. Quarrington paused abruptly. "Don't go yet!" he said. "Dance this with me." His voice sounded strained and uneven.
One hand was clenched on the back of the chair from which he had just risen; the other hung at his side, the fingers opening and shutting nervously. Quarrington smiled. "Don't you?" The eyes of the two men met, and Michael became suddenly conscious that the other was struggling in the grip of some strong emotion. He could even sense its atmosphere of antagonism towards himself.
Incidentally she kissed everybody all round, including Quarrington, and her keen old hawk's eyes grew all soft and luminous like a girl's. Coppertop was hugely excited. "Will the wedding be to-morrow?" he asked hopefully. "And shall I be a page and carry the Fairy Lady's train?" Magda smiled at him. "Of course you shall be a page, Topkins.
At the hotel whither Madame Ribot had directed them, fresh disappointment awaited them. The manager when he found that the two dusty and somewhat dishevelled-looking travellers who presented themselves at the inquiry bureau were actually friends of Signor Quarrington, the famous English artist who had stayed at his hotel was desolated, but the signor had departed a month ago! Had he the address?
It was as though the band of ice which seemed to have clasped itself about her heart when she heard of Michael's marriage had frozen her capacity for feeling anything at all. "I thought once" Davilof was speaking again "I thought once that you had said 'no' to me because of Quarrington. But now I know you never cared for him " "How do you know?"
"Then you'll find the hanging-room for the portrait at Friars' Holm?" queried Lady Arabella, breaking it at last in practical tones. "You know we'd love to have it," replied Magda warmly. In a studiously casual voice she pursued: "By the way, does Mr. Quarrington know I'm here?" Lady Arabella nodded.
She had never troubled about such a thing before, nor was she finding the experience at all a pleasant one. But it helped her to understand to a certain extent though still only in a very modified degree the influences which had sent Michael Quarrington out of England.
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