"Alas!" said Madame von Marwitz above her chocolate, and on a deeper note.
Gregory was convinced that she had known they were not wedding-presents. But her manner was flawless and he saw that she intended to keep it so. She dined with them alone and at the table addressed her talk to him, fixing, as ill-luck would have it, on the theatre as her theme, and on La Gaine d'Or as the piece which, in Paris, had particularly interested her. "You and Karen, of course, saw it when you were there," she said.
It was the piece of sinister fame to which he had refused to take Karen. He owned that they had not seen it.
"Ah, but that is a pity, truly a pity," said Madame von Marwitz. "How did it happen? You cannot have failed to hear of it."
Unable to plead Karen as the cause for his abstention since Madame von Marwitz regretted that Karen had missed the piece, Gregory said that he had heard too much perhaps. "I don't believe I should care for anything the man wrote," he confessed.
"Tiens!" said Madame von Marwitz, opening her eyes. "You know him?"
"Heaven forbid!" Gregory ejaculated, smiling with some tartness.
"But why this rigour? What have you against M. Saumier?"
It was difficult for a young Englishman of conventional tastes to formulate what he had against M. Saumier. Gregory took refuge in evasions. "Oh, I've glanced at reviews of his plays; seen his face in illustrated papers. One gets an idea of a man's personality and the kind of thing he's likely to write."
"A great artist," Madame von Marwitz mildly suggested. "One of our greatest."