Caine was lifting his cigarette to his lips. Conover watched the lazily graceful gesture with more than his wonted contempt.
“Say, Caine,” he interrupted, “why in thunder do you make your nails look like a pink skatin’ rink?”
“If you mean, why do I have them manicured,” answered Caine, coolly, “it is absolutely none of your business.”
“Now I s’pose that’s what you’d call a snub,” ruminated Conover, “But it don’t answer the question. Pink nails all shined up like that may look first rate on a girl. But for a man thirty years old—with a mustache—Say, why do you do it?”
“Why do you wear a necktie?” countered Caine, “I admit it is a surpassingly ugly one. But why wear one at all? It doesn’t keep you warm. It has no use.”
“Clo’es don’t make a man,” stammered Conover, rather discomfited at the riposte, “But there’s no use creatin’ a disturbance by goin’ round without ’em. As for my necktie, it shows I ain’t a day laborer for one thing.”
“Well-groomed hands are just as certain a sign manual of another sort,” finished Caine.
“I don’t quite get your meanin’. If—”
“As a failure you would have been a success, Conover,” interrupted Caine, “But as a success you are in some ways a lamentable failure. To paraphrase your own inspired words, if all the things you don’t know about social usage were placed end to end—”
“They’d cover a mighty long list of measly useless information. What do I care for such rot?”