“How beautifully you play!” said he, leaning over my chair and looking at me. “I never knew such a pretty girl as you take the trouble to learn anything properly before.”
I had been so much spoilt that day by flattery that I only answered calmly—
“Why shouldn’t pretty people learn things as well as ugly people, Mr. Carruthers?”
“Don’t call me ‘Mr. Carruthers’; nobody calls me ‘Mr. Carruthers’—at least, nobody nice. If you don’t yet feel equal to saying ‘Tom,’ let the matter remain in abeyance for the present. Now, to continue from the point where I lost my temper, ugly people have to be accomplished and good and all sorts of things, to get a little of the attention that a pretty person can get without any trouble at all.”
“Ah, but it is different if you have to earn your own living! If you are a governess, for instance, people don’t care about what you look like, but about what you know.”
He stroked his mustache meditatively, looked at me, and said—
“Of course; I forgot that. I suppose you have to know a lot to teach. I am sure you know more than any woman in this room.”
“Oh, no, indeed I don’t! They are all a great, great deal cleverer than I am. I couldn’t talk as they do.”
“Heaven forbid!” muttered he, as if to himself. “They know how to chaff—that’s all. Did you ever meet any of them before?”
“Never before to-day.”