MARRIAGE OF HARLEQUIN. By Pamela Frankau. (Hurst and Blackett. 7s.
6d.)—Sydney Sherrie is eighteen when she inherits a fortune. The glimpses we catch of her at boarding-school show her to be proud, reserved, and essentially gentle beneath her rebellious " superiority." She falls in love with Lionel de Vitrand, a young partner in the publishing firm which issues her first novel. Lionel is cynical and blase, and, throwing up his job because he finds work a " bore," and being unable to live on the thousand a year allowed him by his father, he marries Sydney for money. Sydney soon discovers that he does not love her. A platonic marriage is mutually agreed upon, husband and wife both seeking distraction in bridge, dancing, and cocktails. Then, however, Lionel realizes that he is growing genuinely fond of Sydney. He tells her that he married her for convenience; and the confession blinds her to his statement of the truth that he now loves her. Further misunderstandings and com- plications arise, and both Lionel and Sydney are brought, in their different ways, to the brink of disaster before their Harlequin marriage resolves itself at last into harmony. The story is strong in dialogue, and is a brilliant analysis of temperament.
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