Chapter V is structured around Helen de Vallorbes, who is introduced on the broad steps of Brockhurst feeding pea-fowl in October sunshine. The narrator portrays her as a connoisseur of the “great comedy of existence,” alert to “the echo of eternal laughter,” and conscious that Brockhurst holds “raw material” for a first-rate drama — chiefly her cousin Richard. The formal etiquette surrounding his disability, she laments, makes private encounter almost impossible. The chapter then recalls her stratagem: during a forenoon ride with her father and Richard, she arranges to view the treasures of the Long Gallery under Richard’s guidance alone. That evening the scene unfolds in the gallery, lit dimly and hung with turquoise satin curtains. Richard shows her a crystal ball mounted in a golden cage, said to have belonged to Mary, Queen of Scots. Their conversation — formally about the object — is in fact “a veil” for unspoken attraction. Helen, gazing into the sphere, sees “mist” rising within it, is seized by convent-bred superstitious terror, crosses herself, and pushes the ball away. It falls, rolls beneath the Pompeian bronze Antinous, and is lost in the shadow. Richard, intending to retrieve it, reveals the full extent of his deformity as he shifts in his high-backed chair; Helen restrains him with her hands upon his shoulders, and the two linger in silence until the distant dinner-bell rings and the valet Powell appears. Helen subsequently joins Lady Calmady to visit the conservatories; the old dog Camp, the chapter notes, sulks homeward in disapproval of the newcomer.
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