He dreamt of magnificence and
boot-brushes kept sticking out of this dream like black mud out of snow.
In his reverie he looked about for Ruth Earp, but she was invisible.
Then he went downstairs again, idly; gorgeously feigning that he spent
six evenings a week in ascending and descending monumental staircases,
appropriately clad. He was determined to be as sublime as any one.
There was a stir in the corridor, and the sublimest consented to be
excited.
The Countess was announced to be imminent. Everybody was grouped round
the main portal, careless of temperatures. Six times was the Countess
announced to be imminent before she actually appeared, expanding from
the narrow gloom of her black carriage like a magic vision. Aldermen
received her--and they did not do it with any excess of gracefulness.
They seemed afraid of her, as though she was recovering from influenza
and they feared to catch it. She had precisely the same high voice, and
precisely the same efficient smile, as she had employed to Denry, and
these instruments worked marvels on aldermen; they were as melting as
salt on snow. The Countess disappeared upstairs in a cloud of shrill
apologies and trailing aldermen.
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