"You could have them period."

Mrs. Parry looked at her approvingly. "Exactly, my dear,' she said. "A very charming fantasy it might be; we must take care it isn't precious—only period. But, Mr. Stanhope, you haven't told us—are they Dryads?"

"Actually," Stanhope answered, "as I told you, it's more an experiment than anything else. The main thing is—was— that they are non-human."

"Spirits?" said the Watteau young lady with a trill of pleasure.

"If you like," said Stanhope, "only not spiritual. Alive, but with a different life-even from the princess."

"Irony?" Adela exclaimed. "It's a kind of comment, isn't it, Mr. Stanhope, on futility? The forest and everything, and the princess and her lover—so transitory."

Stanhope shook his head. There was a story, invented by himself, that The Times had once sent a representative to ask for explanations about a new play, and that Stanhope, in his efforts to explain it, had found after four hours that he had only succeeded in reading it completely through aloud: "Which," he maintained, "was the only way of explaining it."

"No," he said now, "not irony. I think perhaps you'd better cut them out."

There was a moment's pause. "But we can't do that, Mr. Stanhope," said a voice; "they're important to the poetry, aren't they?" it was the voice of another young woman, sitting behind Adela. Her name was Pauline Anstruther, and, compared with Adela, she was generally silent. Now, after her quick question, she added hastily, "I mean-they come in when the princess and the wood-cutter come together, don't they?" Stanhope looked at her, and she felt as if his eyes had opened suddenly. He said, more slowly:

"In a way, but they needn't. We could just make it chance."

"I don't think that would be nearly as satisfactory," Mrs. Parry said. "I begin to see my way—the trees perhaps—leaves—to have the leaves of the wood all so helpful to the young people—so charming!"

"It's a terribly sweet idea," said the Watteau young lady. "And so true too!"

Pauline, who was sitting next her, said in an undertone: "True?"

"Don't you think so?" Watteau, whose actual name was Myrtle Fox, asked. "It's what I always feel-about trees and flowers and leaves and so on—they're so friendly. Perhaps you don't notice it so much; I'm rather mystic about nature. Like Wordsworth. I should love to spend days out with nothing but the trees and the leaves and the wind. Only somehow one never seems to have time. But I do believe they're all breathing in with us, and it's such a comfort-here, where there are so many trees. Of course, we've only to sink into ourselves to find peace—and trees and clouds and so on all help us. One never need be unhappy. Nature's so terribly good.