‘That is to say, it didn’t cost twenty guineas. Well, I hope not.
I notice, too, that she has been purchasing a new hat.’
‘Oh, that was very inexpensive. She trimmed it herself.’
‘Did she? Is there any particular, any quite special, reason for this expenditure?’
‘I really can’t say, Jasper.’
‘That’s ambiguous, you know. Perhaps it means you won’t allow yourself to say?’
‘No, Maud doesn’t tell me about things of that kind.’
He took opportunities of investigating the matter, with the result that some ten days after he sought private colloquy with Maud herself. She had asked his opinion of a little paper she was going to send to a ladies’ illustrated weekly, and he summoned her to his own room.
‘I think this will do pretty well,’ he said. ‘There’s rather too much thought in it, perhaps. Suppose you knock out one or two of the less obvious reflections, and substitute a wholesome commonplace? You’ll have a better chance, I assure you.’
‘But I shall make it worthless.’