"I? Good lord, no. I was in love with a woman of forty when I was seventeen."
His eyes were glowing into hers and she demanded abruptly: "Do you think I am forty?"
"Rather not!"
"Well, I am young," she said with a deep sigh of content. "But look! I see nothing, but I see everything."
Clavering glanced about him. Every neck in the boxes and neighboring seats was craned. It was evident that the people in front—and no doubt behind—were listening intently, although they could have caught no more than an occasional word of the murmured conversation. Eyes across the aisle, when not distended with surprise, glared at him. He laughed softly.
"I am the best hated man in New York tonight." Then he asked abruptly: "If you wish to avoid fashionable society why not see something of this? It would be quite a new experience and vary the monotony of books and plays."
"I may—some time, if you will kindly arrange it. But I am not a stranger to the cognoscenti. In London, of course, they are received, sought after. In Paris not so much, but one still meets them.—the most distinguished. In Berlin the men might go to court but not the women. In Vienna—well, genius will not give quarterings. But alas! so many gifted people seem to come out of the bourgeoisie, or lower down still—whether they are received or not depends largely on their table manners."
"Oh, I assure you, our cognoscenti have very good table manners indeed!"
"I am sure of it," she said graciously. "I have an idea that American table manners are the best in the world. Is it true that one never sees toothpicks on the table here?"
"Good lord, yes!"