Chapter 64

Then she made a fresh discovery, which again scattered her regrets in the wind of her excitement. She discovered a nosegay upon her dressing-table: two orchids and a spray of maiden-hair fern. She flew into John’s dressing-room next door, and there discovered the masculine counterpart: a buttonhole consisting of one exquisitely furled yellow rosebud. John by then was in his bath. She stood, cupping the rosebud within her hands as though it represented the total and final expression of everything refined and luxurio…