The other person who was really crying was Ann. As she was on Hugh's deaf side he could not hear her sobs, but he could feel against the sleeve of his overcoat the convulsive movements of her shoulder. He gave her a quick sideways look. Her eyes and nose were red, but the rest of her face absurdly retained its usual waxen paleness so that she looked like a rather damp clown. A wet scarf covered her hair, which had been, when Randall married her, so flaming, but which had faded to a pale ginger now on its way to becoming a sandy grey. She had loved Fanny; and Fanny had loved her too, in her way. 'Such a serious girl', Fanny had said of her at first, a little timidly, a little suspiciously; and timidity and suspicion had always remained to temper their good relations, for Fanny was never very far from thinking that Ann thought her a fool. But Fanny had believed in Randall's marriage, had believed in it right up to the end, seeing no danger signs and noticing no deterioration; and perhaps that very belief had helped to keep Ann and Randall together.

We brought nothing into this world and it is certain we can carry nothing out.

It was true that Fanny had brought nothing into this world. On the other hand she had had plenty of things waiting for her when she arrived. It was many years now since Hugh had stopped wondering to what extent he had married for money. Plump rose-red Fanny had somehow so much made one with her rich art-dealer father and the great family collection that it made no sense even to ask whether he had married her for the pictures: and by the time the pictures went away to the boorish brother and the collection was dispersed Hugh hardly wanted them any more. Except the Tintoretto. That he had always wanted, and his wish had been rewarded, since Fanny got the gem, the Tintoretto. Perhaps indeed he had married her for the Tintoretto, as in a curious muddled way it had sometimes seemed to him in his dreams when his poor wife and the picture became strangely identified with each other.



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