She was an imposing¹ figure, beautifully dressed in black. She was handsomer than her picture, and younger-looking than we expected. It occurred to me that bio-vibratory sympathism had a thinning effect.  
Her manner was more decisive than I had expected from a dreamer. Very commanding and important, she stood there with her liveried servant behind her. Bettina had known her instantly by the grey hair rolled high and the pear-shaped earrings².
 
She kissed us, and said I was more like my mother. And were our boxes labelled?
 
She hardly waited for us to answer. She did not wait at all for our little trunk.
 
"A footman will attend to the luggage," she said. As she led us down the platform, her eyes kept darting³ about in a way that made me think she must be expecting someone else by that train. I looked round, too. But nobody else seemed to[Pg 254] be expecting Aunt Josephine, though a woman towards the end of the platform looked very searchingly at our party as we passed. Aunt Josephine did not seem to notice. She was busy putting on a thick motor-veil over the lace one that was tied round her hat—her lovely hat, that, as Betty said afterwards, was "boiling over with black ostrich-feathers."
 
A wonderful scent⁴ had come towards us with Aunt Josephine—nothing the least like that faint garden-smell that clung to our linen⁵, from the sprays of lavender and dried verbena our mother put newly each year under the white paper of our wardrobe-shelves. Such a ghost of fragrance⁶ could never have survived here. This perfume of Aunt Josephine's—not so much strong as dominant—routed the sooty, acrid⁷ smell of the station. When she lifted her arms to put the chiffon over her face, fresh waves of the rich, mysterious scent came towards us.
 
She seemed in haste to leave so mean a place as Victoria. She spoke⁸ a little sharply to the footman. He explained—and, indeed, we could see—that a great, shining motor-car was threading its way as well as it could through a tangle⁹ of[Pg 255] taxi-cabs and inferior cars. Aunt Josephine stood frowning under her double veil, and once I saw her eyes go towards the woman who had noticed us. The woman was speaking to one of the porters. The porter, too, looked at Aunt Josephine and nodded. The dowdy¹⁰ woman gave the porter a tip, and sent him on an errand. I was far too excited to notice such uninteresting people, but for the curious personal kind of detestation in the look the dowdy woman fixed¹¹ upon Aunt Josephine.
 
"We won't wait," said our aunt. "We'll take this taxi."
 
But just then the beautiful shining car swerved¹² free, and we were hurried in. The footman spread a rug over our knees. As we glided¹³ out of the station I noticed the dowdy woman asking her way of a policeman.
 
And the policeman didn't know the way. He shook his head. And both of them looked after us.
 
As we whirled through the crowded streets I felt how everyone must be envying Bettina and me.
 
Presently we came to a quiet corner. The[Pg 256] houses stood back from the street, in gardens. Our aunt's was one of these.
 
I was too excited to notice much about the outside. But the inside!
 
Betty and I exchanged looks. We had no idea Aunt Josephine was so rich. There were more big footmen—foreigners; very quick and quiet.
 
The entrance-hall and stairs were wide and dim. When the front-door was shut, the house seemed as silent as a church on a week-day, and the soft-footed servants rather like the sidesmen who show strangers to their places. The very window was like a window in a church. It had stained glass in it, and black lines divided it from top to bottom, into sections, like church windows.
 
If I had ventured to speak I should have whispered. Not even at Lord Helmstone's had we trodden on such carpets. No wonder our footsteps made no sound. Going upstairs we seemed like a procession in a picture. That was because the walls were immense mirrors separated by gilded¹⁴ columns.
 
Aunt Josephine had taken off her motor-veil. She had certainly grown much thinner since she[Pg 257] had the photograph taken. That accounted for her being a more "aquiline¹⁵" aunt than we expected. Her nose curved down, especially when she smiled. And her eyes were not sleepy at all—a full yellow eye, the iris¹⁶ almost black.
 
We followed her along a corridor till she threw open a door. "This is yours," she said in the voice that was both sharp and quick.
 
I looked into the wonderful pink and white room. Instead of two little beds, as we had at home, was one very large one. It looked like an Oriental throne with rose-silk hangings.
 
"I will send you up some tea," she said. "And you must rest. I am having a friend or two to dine. So wear your smartest gown. Come," she said to Betty.
 
"Betty is the one who ought to rest," I said.
 
"And so she shall," our aunt said. "I will show Betty her room."
 
Betty looked blank.
 
"We are not to be together?" she asked.
 
"Together!" Aunt Josephine repeated the word with the smile that drew her nose down. "Oh, you shall have a room of your own."
 
Betty moved a little nearer me.[Pg 258]
 
I explained that she and I always had the same room.
 
"Yes, in a small house. Here there is no need."
 
I wanted to tell her that it was not need that made us share things. But though poor Betty looked cast down, all I said was that I should come to her in plenty of time to do her hair.
 
"A maid will do that," my aunt said.
 
But I managed to tell her quite firmly that I must show the maid how.
 
Aunt Josephine looked at me a moment.
 
She doesn't like me, I thought. And I felt uncomfortable.
 
As she followed her out, Betty made a sign over her shoulder that I was to come now.
 
But after that look Aunt Josephine had given me, I felt I must walk warily¹⁷. So I only signalled back, as much as to say "by-and-by."
 
A woman in a cap and apron¹⁸ brought me tea.
 
I asked if she would mind taking the tray to my sister's room so we could have tea together.
 
The woman said madam's orders were that the young ladies should rest. I reflected that Bettina[Pg 259] would probably rest better if she did not talk, so I said no more.
 
The woman had a face like wood.
 
Two of the big footmen brought in our little trunk. I got out Bettina's dressing¹⁹-gown and slippers<............