He was glad to be able to give a satisfactory answer.
After a pause she resumed bravely:
"So Mr. Farll was one of these artists? At least so I see according to the paper."
He nodded.
"It's a very funny business," she said. "But I suppose there's some of them make quite a nice income out of it. You ought to know about that, being in it, as it were."
Never in his life had he conversed on such terms with such a person as Mrs. Alice Challice. She was in every way a novelty for him--in clothes, manners, accent, deportment, outlook on the world and on paint. He had heard and read of such beings as Mrs. Alice Challice, and now he was in direct contact with one of them. The whole affair struck him as excessively odd, as a mad escapade on his part. Wisdom in him deemed it ridiculous to prolong the encounter, but shy folly could not break loose. Moreover she possessed the charm of her novelty; and there was that in her which challenged the male in him.
"Well," she said, "I suppose we can't stand here for ever!"
The crowd had frittered itself away, and an attendant was closing and locking the doors of St. George's Hall. He coughed.
"It's a pity it's Saturday and all the shops closed. But anyhow suppose we walk along Oxford Street all the same? Shall we?" This from her.
"By all means."