But, with the breaking off of diplomatic relations, matters remained
for a time at a standstill. Natalie dried her eyes and ordered some new
clothes, and saw rather more of Rodney Page than was good for her.
With the beginning of February the country house was far enough under
way for it to be promised for June, and Natalie, the fundamentals of its
decoration arranged for, began to haunt old-furniture shops, accompanied
always by Rodney.
"Not that your taste is not right, Natalie," he explained. "It is
exquisite. But these fellows are liars and cheats, some of them.
Besides, I like trailing along, if you don't mind."
Trailing along was a fairly accurate phrase. There was scarcely a day
now when Natalie's shining car, with its two men in livery, did not draw
up before Rodney's office building, or stand, as unostentatiously as a
fire engine, not too near the entrance of his club. Clayton, going
in, had seen it there once or twice, and had smiled rather grimly. He
considered its presence there in questionable taste, but he felt no
uneasiness. Determined as he was to give Natalie such happiness as was
still in him to give, he never mentioned these instances.
But a day came, early in February, which was to mark a change in the
relationship between Natalie and Rodney.
It started simply enough. They had lunched together at a down-town
hotel, and then went to look at rugs. Rodney had found her rather
obdurate as to old rugs. They were still arguing the matter in the
limousine.
"I just don't like to think of all sorts of dirty Turks and Arabs having
used them," she protested. "Slept on them, walked on them, spilled
things on the--? ugh!"
"But the colors, Natalie dear! The old faded 'copper-tones, the
dull-blues, the dead-rose! There is a beauty about age, you know. Lovely
as you are, you'll be even lovelier as an old woman."
"I'm getting there rather rapidly."
He turned and looked at her critically. No slightest aid that she had
given her beauty missed his eyes, the delicate artificial lights in her
hair, her eyebrows drawn to a hair's breadth and carefully arched, the
touch of rouge under her eyes and on the lobes of her ears. But she was
beautiful, no matter what art had augmented her real prettiness. She was
a charming, finished product, from her veil and hat to her narrowly
shod feet. He liked finished things, well done. He liked the glaze on a
porcelain; he liked the perfect lacquering on the Chinese screen he had
persuaded Natalie to buy; he preferred wood carved into the fine lines
of Sheraton to the trees that grow in the Park, for instance, through
which they were driving.