“Do you avoid your neighbor’s corns, my young lady?” Perior inquired.
“I never think of such unpleasantnesses,” Camelia replied lightly. “As I haven’t any corns myself, I proceed upon the supposition that other people enjoy my immunity. If they don’t, why, that is their own fault—let them cut them and give up tight boots.”
Perior, looking on the floor, his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped, laughed again.
“Little pagan!” he said.
“Frank, healthy paganism, an excellent thing. I don’t own to it, mind; but is not the soul in our modern sense a disease of the body?”
“Oh, Camelia!” said Lady Paton, looking up with eyes rounded. Camelia’s smile reassured her somewhat, and she glanced for its confirmation at Perior.
Mary Fairleigh, in her distant seat, carefully drew her silk about the contour of an alarming flower.
“Never mind, Lady Paton, she doesn’t shock me at all,” said Perior.
“I am glad of that, Michael; she will make herself misunderstood. Camelia dear, it is one o’clock. The others must be in the drawing-room. Shall we go there?”
“Willingly, Mamma. I’m very hungry. Did you order a good lunch, Mary?”