He took one and lit it, absently, in the blue flame of the spirit-lamp, and she watched him closely with her bright, curious eyes.
"You know this Mr. Lightmark very well, don't you, Philip?"
"Intimately," he answered, nodding.
"You must be pleased," she said. "It is a great match for him, a struggling artist. Can he paint, by the way?"
"He has great talent." He held his cigarette away from him, considered the ash critically. "Yes, he can certainly paint. I suppose it is a good thing—and for Eve, too. Why should it not be?"
"He is a charming young man"—she spoke judicially—"charming! But in effect Mary was quite right; she generally is—he is not sincere."
"I think you are wrong," said Rainham after a moment. "I should be sorry to believe you were not, for the little girl's sake. And I have known him a long time; he is a good fellow at bottom."
"Ah!" cried Lady Garnett with a little, quick gesture of her right hand, "that is precisely what he is not. He exaggerates; he must be very secret; no one ever was so frank as he seems to be."
"Why are you saying all this to me?" the other asked after a moment.
"You know I should be very sorry; but what can I do? it's arranged."
"I think you might have prevented it, if you had cared; but, as you say, it is too late now."