“Well,” he said, “you might occupy yourself worse.”
He was fairly puzzled, I could see, and, to protect himself, turned the talk in other directions, leaving me to my own cogitations. Miss Christmas, sitting opposite me, seized the opportunity to engage him to herself—no great task, for the old man was genuinely attached to her.
“What do you think of my frock, dear?” she said. “I want your opinion, because you are a judge, you know.”
But he accepted her banter seriously. He was in an oddly sober mood.
“I think,” he said, “that, like charity, it covers a multitude of sins.”
“O!” she cried, “how terribly severe! I am only a whited sepulchre after all. In the midst of life we are in death.”
“I’ll make a note of that,” I said. “It sounds like one of Mr Pugsley’s original reflections. But of course we are. Don’t you feel it, my lady?”
I don’t know what demon was urging me. Lord Skene suddenly exclaimed: “Georgina! is anything the matter?”
She was leaning back in her chair, looking white and faint; but she rallied immediately.
“Nothing whatever,” she said. “What makes you think so? Go on with your dinner—please do.”