Turkish harem were set haphazard on the mosaic floor. In the centre a
stone fountain of the modern-primitive school and banked with flowers
splashed noisily. Somehow it offered Kensington the final insult. But
she had wanted it, just as she had wanted the Greek columns. There was
even a certain magnificence about the room's absurdity. It was so
hopelessly wrong that it attained a kind of perfection.

She herself sat on the edge of the fountain and fed a gorgeous macaw
who, from his gilded perch, received her offerings with a lofty
friendliness. But as Stonehouse entered she sprang up and ran to him,
feeling through his pockets like an excited child.

"The poison--the poison!" she demanded.

He had to laugh.

"I forgot it," he said.

"_C'est dommage_. You 'ave not taken it yourself by any chance?"

"No--I wouldn't do that at any rate."

"_C'est vrai_. I ask--you 'ave an air _un peu souffrant_. Well, never
mind. It's droll though--I think about you just when you ring up--I
'ave a damn pain--not ze tummy-ache this time--and I say: '_Le pauvre
jeune homme_, 'ere is a chance for 'im to pay me out for kissing 'im
when 'e don't want to be kissed.' You remember--I say I send for you
one day. But ze old pain--it 'as gone now. You--'ow do you say?--you
conjure it away."