"Oh, of course! You're a judge or something like that, aren't you?"
Was the man a little deaf?
"Something like that."
She noted that trick of pausing a second or two before answering. Ilseboro had had it too. It was rather effective in a way. It made the other person wonder if what he had said was foolish. He wasn't deaf a bit—quite the contrary.
"Aren't you going to tell me what you are?" she said.
He shook his head gravely. Then her eye fell on Gore standing at her elbow and she couldn't resist the temptation. She turned her back on Eleanor's discovery.
"Hullo, Mr. Gore! Did you expect to meet a barbarian at dinner—especially a futile one?"
Gore, unabashed, took the whole room in.
"Now," he said in his high-pitched voice, "could anything be more barbarous than that attack? Oh, yes, I said it; and what's worse, I think it, my dear young lady—I think it!"
She turned back to O'Bannon.