De Nemours shrugged his shoulders, raising whimsical eyebrows at the slim young giant towering above him.
“Mon cher, one cannot put the lady into two words. Voyons—she is, as our Alfred so charmingly puts it, blonde like the wheat——”
“Oh, rot.” The ardent voice of the British representative was curt to the point of rudeness, and De Nemour’s smile became exquisitely courteous. “I don’t care whether she’s an albino. She’s the American representative on this committee, and I’m interested in her mental qualifications. Is she intelligent?”
“Intelligent! Ah, my poor friend, she is far, far worse.” His smile grew reminiscent as he lit his cigarette. “She has a wit like a shining sword, and eyelashes of a truly fantastic length.”
“And every time her eyes shine you think it’s the sword,” commented O’Hara bitterly. “God, this is hideous! I can see her sitting there chattering epigrams and fluttering dimples——”
“You do Mrs. Lindsay an injustice,” said another voice quietly, and O’Hara swung around with a slight start.
“Oh, Celati, I clean forgot that you were there. I thought that you had never met the lady.”
“Unfortunately for me, you are entirely correct. But last night I came in after the dinner for some bridge, and I watched Mrs. Lindsay with great interest, with great admiration, for more than half an hour. There was a most fat Senator from the South talking to her, and she was listening. I say listening, mark. In this great country the most charming of women feel that they have already acquired all desirable information and wisdom and that it is their not unpainful function to disseminate it. I find that it makes intercourse more exciting than flattering. But Mrs. Lindsay was—listening.”
“You mean to say that she said nothing at all in half an hour?” O’Hara’s tone was flatly incredulous.
“Oh, si, si, she spoke three times—and if one may judge by the human countenance, I dare to wager that that most fat Senator thought that never woman spoke more wittily or wisely.”