Returning home one night Clavering (Conway Tearle) found Janet Oglethorpe (Clara Bow), daughter of his old friend, in a semi-intoxicated condition. (Screen version of "The Black Oxen.")
"I suppose you pride yourself on being a good sport."
"Rather. If Donny'd been ill I'd have stayed with him all night, but he was dead to the world."
"You say he had a party. Why didn't some of the others take you home?"
"Ever hear about three being a crowd? Donny, naturally, was all for taking me home, and didn't show any signs of collapse till the last minute."
"But I should think that for decency's sake you'd all have gone down together."
"Lord! How old-fashioned you are. I was finishing a cigarette and never thought of it." She opened a little gold mesh bag, took out a cigarette and lit it. Her cheeks were flushed under the rouge and her large black eyes glittered in her fluid little face. She was one of the beauties of the season's débutantes, but scornful of nature. Her olive complexion was thickly powdered and there was a delicate smudge of black under her lower lashes and even on her eyelids. He had never seen her quite so blatantly made up before, but then he had seen little of her since the beginning of her first season. He rarely went to parties, and she was almost as rarely in her own home or her grandmother's. Her short hair curled about her face. In spite of her paint she looked like a child—a greedy child playing with life.
"Look here!" he said. "How far do you go?"
"Wouldn't you like to know?"
"I should. Not for personal reasons, for girls of your age bore me to extinction, but you've a certain sociological interest. I wonder if you are really any worse than your predecessors?"