This explains why Landi was the only creature to whom Edith could tell everything, and did. Must not all nice people have a confidant? And no girl or woman friend—much as they might like her, and she them—could ever take the place of Landi, the wise and ever-sympathetic.
There was something in his mental attitude that was not unfeminine, direct and assertive as he was. He had what is generally known as feminine intuition, a quality perhaps even rarer in women than in men.
* * * * *
Tonight the persistently hospitable Mrs Mitchell had a large party. Dressed in grey, she was receiving her guests in the big room on the ground floor, and tactfully directing the conversation of a crowd of various and more or less interesting persons.
It was one of those parties that had been described as a Russian Salad, where one ran an equal risk—or took an equal chance—of being taken to dinner by Charlie Chaplin or Winston Churchill, and where society and the stage were equally well represented. Young officers on leave and a few pretty girls filled the vacancies.
As Bruce, Edith and Madame Frabelle came in together, Landi went straight to Edith's side.
Looking at her through his eyeglass, he said, as if to himself, in an anxious tone:
'Elle a quelquechose, cette enfant; oui, elle a quelquechose,' and as the last guest had not arrived he sat down thoughtfully by her on the small sofa.
'Yes, Landi, there is something the matter. I'm longing to tell you about it. I want your advice,' said Edith, smiling.
'Tout se sait; tout se fait; tout s'arrange,' sententiously remarked
Landi, who was not above talking oracular commonplaces at times.