"I guarantee," said Brent.
She changed from seriousness to a mocking kind of gayety—that is, to a seriousness so profound that she would not show it. And she said:
"You see I simply must banish my old women—and that hunchback and his piano. They get on my nerves."
He smiled humorously at her. But behind the smile his gaze—grave, sympathetic—pierced into her soul, seeking the meaning he knew she would never put into words.
At the sound of voices in the hall she said:
"We'll talk of this again."
At lunch that day she, for the first time in many a week, listened without irritation while Freddie poured forth his unending praise of "my wife." As Brent knew them intimately, Freddie felt free to expatiate upon all the details of domestic economy that chanced to be his theme, with the exquisite lunch as a text. He told Brent how Susan had made a study of that branch of the art of living; how she had explored the unrivaled Parisian markets and groceries and shops that dealt in specialties; how she had developed their breakfasts, dinners, and lunches to works of art. It is impossible for anyone, however stupid, to stop long in Paris without beginning to idealize the material side of life—for the French, who build solidly, first idealize food, clothing, and shelter, before going on to take up the higher side of life—as a sane man builds his foundation before his first story, and so on, putting the observation tower on last of all, instead of making an ass of himself trying to hang his tower to the stars. Our idealization goes forward haltingly and hypocritically because we try to build from the stars down, instead of from the ground up. The place to seek the ideal is in the homely, the commonplace, and the necessary. An ideal that does not spring deep-rooted from the soil of practical life may be a topic for a sermon or a novel or for idle conversation among silly and pretentious people. But what use has it in a world that must live, and must be taught to live?
Freddie was unaware that he was describing a further development of Susan—a course she was taking in the university of experience—she who had passed through its common school, its high school, its college. To him her clever housekeeping offered simply another instance of her cleverness in general. His discourse was in bad taste. But its bad taste was tolerable because he was interesting—food, like sex, being one of those universal subjects that command and hold the attention of all mankind. He rose to no mean height of eloquence in describing their dinner of the evening before—the game soup that brought to him visions of a hunting excursion he had once made into the wilds of Canada; the way the barbue was cooked and served; the incredible duck—and the salad! Clélie interrupted to describe that salad as like a breath of summer air from fields and limpid brooks. He declared that the cheese—which Susan had found in a shop in the Marche St. Honoré—was more wonderful than the most wonderful petit Suisse. "And the coffee!" he exclaimed. "But you'll see in a few minutes. We have coffee here."
"Quelle histoire!" exclaimed Brent, when Freddie had concluded. And he looked at Susan with the ironic, quizzical gleam in his eyes.
She colored. "I am learning to live," said she. "That's what we're on earth for—isn't it?"