Lady Rhoda. I say! Do you call him as good-lookin' as all that?
Lady Maisie. I was not thinking about his looks, Rhoda—it's his conduct that's so splendid.
Lady Rhoda. His conduct? Don't see anything splendid in missin' a train. I could do it myself if I tried.
Lady Maisie. Well, I wish I could think there were many men capable of acting so nobly and generously as he did.
Lady Rhoda. As how?
Lady Maisie. You really don't see! Well, then, you shall. He arrives late, and finds that somebody else is here already in his character. He makes no fuss; manages to get a private interview with the person who is passing as himself; when, of course, he soon discovers that poor Mr. Spurrell is as much deceived as anybody else. What is he to do? Humiliate the unfortunate man by letting him know the truth? Mortify my uncle and aunt by a public explanation before a whole dinner-party? That is what a stupid or a selfish man might have done, almost without thinking. But not Mr. Blair. He has too much tact, too much imagination, too much chivalry for that. He saw at once that his only course was to spare his host and hostess, and—and all of us a scene, by slipping away quietly and unostentatiously, as he had come.
Lady Rhoda (yawning). If he saw all that, why didn't he do it?
Lady Maisie (indignantly). Why? How provoking you can be, Rhoda! Why? Because that stupid Tredwell wouldn't let him! Because Archie delayed him by some idiotic practical joke! Because Mr. Spurrell went and blurted it all out!... Oh, don't try to run down a really fine act like that; because you can't—you simply can't!
Lady Rhoda (after a low whistle). No idea it had gone so far as that—already! Now I begin to see why Gerry Thicknesse has been lookin' as if he'd sat on his best hat, and why he told your aunt he might have to be off to-morrow; which is all stuff, because I happen to know his leave ain't up for two or three days yet. But he sees this Troubadour has put his poor old nose out of joint for him.
Lady Maisie (flushing). Now, Rhoda, I won't have you talking as if—as if—— You ought to know, if Gerald Thicknesse doesn't, that it's nothing at all of that sort! It's just—— Oh, I can't tell you how some of his poems moved me, what new ideas, wider views they seemed to teach; and then how dreadfully it hurt to think it was only Mr. Spurrell after all!... But now—oh, the relief of finding they're not spoilt; that I can still admire, still look up to the man who wrote them! Not to have to feel that he is quite commonplace—not even a gentleman—in the ordinary sense!