“If she does, she’s very remarkable—she deserves great honour.”
“You really care; why is she more remarkable than you?” Hyacinth demanded.
“Oh, it’s very different—she’s so wonderfully attractive!” Lady Aurora replied, making, recklessly, the only allusion to the oddity of her own appearance in which Hyacinth was destined to hear her indulge. She became conscious of it the moment she had spoken, and said, quickly, to turn it off, “I should like to talk with her, but I’m rather afraid. She’s tremendously clever.”
“Ah, what she is you’ll find out when you know her!” Hyacinth sighed, expressively.
His hostess looked at him a little, and then, vaguely, exclaimed, “How very interesting!” The next moment she continued, “She might do so many other things; she might charm the world.”
“She does that, whatever she does,” said Hyacinth, smiling. “It’s all by the way; it needn’t interfere.”
“That’s what I mean, that most other people would be content—beautiful as she is. There’s great merit, when you give up something.”
“She has known a great many bad people, and she wants to know some good,” Hyacinth rejoined. “Therefore be sure to go to her soon.”
“She looks as if she had known nothing bad since she was born,” said Lady Aurora, rapturously. “I can’t imagine her going into all the dreadful places that she would have to.”
“You have gone into them, and it hasn’t hurt you,” Hyacinth suggested.