"I think it is only you whom I understand, Miss Farringdon; and that only because you and I are so much alike."
"I should have thought you would have understood everybody, you have such quick perceptions and such keen sympathies." Elisabeth, for all her cleverness, had yet to learn to differentiate between the understanding heart and the understanding head. There is but little real similarity between the physician who makes an accurate diagnosis of one's condition, and the friend who suffers from the identical disease.
"No; I don't understand everybody. I don't understand all these fine people whom we are with to-day, for instance. They seem to me so utterly worldly and frivolous and irresponsible, that I haven't patience with them. I daresay they look down upon me for not having blood, and I know I look down upon them for not having brains."
Elisabeth's eyes twinkled in spite of herself. She remembered how completely Cecil had been out of it in the conversation on the launch; and she wondered whether the King of Nineveh had ever invited Jonah to the state banquets. She inclined to the belief that he had not.
"But they have brains," was all she said.
Cecil was undeniably cross. "They talk a lot of nonsense," he retorted pettishly.
"Exactly. People without brains never talk nonsense; that is just where the difference comes in. If a man talks clever nonsense to me, I know that man isn't a fool; it is a sure test."
"There is nonsense and nonsense."
"And there are fools and fools." Elisabeth spoke severely; she was always merciless upon anything in the shape of humbug or snobbery. Maria Farringdon's training had not been thrown away.
"I despise mere frivolity," said Cecil loftily.