"I walked home with Miss Jones this afternoon." Carrington, with his ultra-æsthetic sensibilities, must find Miss Jones even more jarring than I did, and his act implied a very kindly interest.
"That was nice of you," I observed, though at the mention of Miss Jones that piercing stab of shame again went through me, and my eyes unwillingly, guiltily sought the eyes of my smiling Manon.
"She was rather troubled about something she had said," Carrington pursued, ignoring my approbation, "about the picture. Of course she doesn't know anything about pictures."
"No," I murmured, "she doesn't."
"By Jove!" added Carrington, "that's the trouble. She doesn't understand anything!"
"What do you mean?"
"Why, I mean that she could never see certain things from our standpoint; she is as ignorant and as innocent as a baby. She's never read 'Manon Lescaut'—that came out en passant—and, by Jove, you know, it does seem a beastly shame! A girl like that! A snow-drop!"
Carrington cast a look of unmistakable resentment at my poor Manon.
"Well," I said, lamely—indeed I felt maimed—"how was I to know? And what am I to do?"
"Why, my dear fellow," and Carrington spoke with some fierceness, "you've nothing to do with it! I'm to blame! I told you about her. Said she had the type! Dull, blundering fool that I was not to have seen the shrieking incongruity! The rigidly upright soul of her! That girl couldn't tell a lie nor look one; and Manon!"