“Or a—dilettante,” mischievously added Danford.
“I should have thought that what was more important than finding out in what way one man was differentiated from another, was to discover the points in which they were alike,” said Lionel. “You are catching at a straw, my dear Montagu; your system is shallow, and you will never persuade the Upper Ten of its practicableness. For my part, I plainly refuse to envelop my carcass with a Loie Fuller’s sidelight.”
“Your decision is law amongst your peers, my lord,” and Danford bowed.
“We had better start a Society for the obtaining of accurately reported news. Newspapers have disappeared, and with them the necessity has died out for falsifying the truth,” said Lionel.
“I do protest,” interrupted Sinclair, “against plain facts being handed to me by unimaginative people who pass on an ungarnished piece of news without as much as adding one poor little adjective. It is too brutally literal.”
“It all comes, as I was saying,” apologetically remarked Vane, “from a complete lack of artistic feeling.”
“There you are right,” hurriedly said Lionel; “for Parliament is broken up from the lack of dramatic power in its members, and militarism will inevitably die out with the disappearance of military distinctions.”
“And dramatic art is buried since the study of local colour and environment has been abandoned,” sharply added Vane.
“Yes,” sadly echoed Lady Carey, “imagination has been insulted by some terrible creature called Nature.”
“Dear Lady Carey,” suavely murmured the little dilettante, “we can thank God that we have still a few salons—though, alas! a very few—where we can bask in the sunshine of gossip.” Then turning to Lionel, “But do not let me deter you from your plan; and pray telephone to me whenever you want my house for your new Society. I consider it a duty to keep en evidence; if we cannot prevent your reforms, we can at least patronise them, for when Society ceases to lead, it will disappear.”