There was no humour in her voice, but just a tone of weary, world-wise knowledge. A look of displeasure clouded his face.
'Surely,' he said, 'with your qualities and appearance, you don't need such an elaborate technique.'
'In a world where there is so little that is genuine, why should I debar myself from the pleasure of being a humbug?'
'Come, come,' he said, smiling, 'you are not going to join the ranks of
England's detractors?'
She shrugged her shoulders. 'I'm certainly not going to become a professional critic like Stackton Dunckley, who hasn't even the excuse that he's an Irishman; or Lucia Carlotti, who hardly ever leaves London because her dinners cost her nothing. But I reserve the right of personal resentment.'
IV.
They were interrupted by a waiter, who removed the soup-plates with studied dexterity, and substituted Tronçon de turbotin Duglère; pommes vapeur, the dish which had delivered the fatal blow against the Cabinet Minister's digestive armour.
'Perhaps I am too personal,' resumed Selwyn after the completion of this task, 'but last night one of the impressions I took away with me was your critical attitude towards your surroundings. Then this morning you were so completely'——
'Charming?'
'——bewitching,' he said, smiling, 'that I thought myself an idiot for the previous night's opinion. But, then, this evening'——