“But I think they are so beautiful,” said Mrs Masterman, looking up from her plate with a puzzled expression. “Really! sometimes I can hardly tear myself away from Linton’s, they have such beautiful specimens.”
“No? Well, you must take Mr Masterman with you to-morrow. He’ll simply love it, and he won’t know how to tear himself away either. Colonel Masterman will have to come by the next train to try and lure you both home again.”
Ted Masterman’s expression had a “wait-till-I-catch-you” air, but she only went off into an airy description of her youthful admirer on the tennis court, which lasted until the two elder ones retired to their books, leaving her and Ted to amuse each other over their coffee in the conservatory. Paddy at once opened fire with a cross-examination.
“So you live in London?” she remarked; “seems to me one might as well live in a coal mine.”
“Oh, come! that’s rather strong; London is a grand place.”
“It’s a good thing you think so, since you live there. I loathe the very name of it.”
“But why?”
“Why? Everything’s why. Look at the dirt, and the smoke, and the smuts,” in a tone of unutterable disgust. “On a fine day the poor sun struggles to shine through the atmosphere, and only succeeds in giving a pale, sickly glow, and on a wet day the clouds appear to literally rest on the house-tops and rain-smuts. If you look up, you see nothing but roofs and chimneys, and if you look down, you see nothing but paving-stones and basements, and if you look round generally, you see little else but pale, sickly, tired people all trampling on each other to live.”
“Didn’t you ever look in the shops?”
“Yes, and I got so sick of them, I just longed to go inside the windows and jumble everything up into a heap anyhow, and then write a big 1 shilling 11 pence farthing over the whole lot.