"I don't know about that,—one can't help looking at people who are constantly about one."
He made an effort to give this remark the ring of indifference, and he succeeded.
"But that's exactly it!" she cried. "They say that beautiful people are always stupid. That's why I say——"
"Nobody who knows anything about it says that," he observed, as if he were stating an interesting axiomatic principle and without a trace of the leer of the adulator.
"Really?"
"Of course not," he pursued. "For a face to be beautiful, it must have certain proportions. It must have a certain length of nose, a certain length of chin, and above all a certain height of brow. Do you understand?"
"I think so," she replied.
"Well, then,—what is the obvious conclusion?"
"I'm afraid I don't see it," she said.
"I say a certain height of brow is essential to a well-proportioned face," he remarked with cool persuasiveness. "But what lies beneath the brow? Come, Leonetta, you know!"