The Relentless City

by E. F. Benson

'Where did you get that Tanagra figure from?' he asked. 'It's a forgery.' And he took it up and threw it into the grate, where it smashed to atoms.

'Well, I suppose you know,' said Mrs. Palmer calmly. 'Bilton sold it me.'

Lewis laughed.

'Spoiled his market,' he remarked. 'That man's very clever, but he lacks—he lacks length of vision.'

'Perhaps he didn't know it was a forgery,' said Mrs. Palmer charitably.

'That's worse. Give him the credit of knowing.'

Mrs. Palmer put down the paper she was reading.

'Lewis, you didn't come here just to break my things,' she said. 'What is it?'

'Lord Keynes. What do you know of him?' he asked, with his usual directness.

Had Mrs. Palmer been in the company of other people, she would have executed her famous scream, because she was amused. But she never wasted it, and it would have been quite wasted on her husband.