“Oh!” She had already nervously dropped in about three lumps.
“Oh well, never mind. … Yes, you’re looking charming, Madeline—it’s absurd calling you Miss Irwin after knowing each other so long, isn’t it?”
She was so delighted that she almost thanked him for calling her by her Christian name.
“Do you know, Madeline,” he went on, “that, at times, you’re almost a beauty.”
She opened her mouth with surprise.
“Almost. You were one evening—I forget which evening—you had something gold in your hair, and you were quite Byzantine. And then, again, a few days after I saw you, and—er—oh well, anyhow—you always look nice.”
“I suppose you mean,” she murmured, feeling shy at talking so much of herself, “that most girls look best in the evening.”
“There I venture to differ from you entirely. All girls, all women, look their best in the afternoon. The hat is everything. Evening dress is the most trying and unbecoming thing in the world; only the most perfect beauties, who are also very young and fresh, can stand it. The most becoming thing for a woman is either négligé, or a hat. You, particularly, Madeline, look your best in the afternoon.”
“I wish then that I lived in that land where it is always afternoon!” she said, laughing.
He gave his superior little smile. “The Lotus Eaters? Good. I didn’t know you cared for Tennyson.”