“If you want him kept then indefinitely you’re inconsistent. Besides, if he pays for it he deserves to pay. He’s an abominable little conspirator against society.”
Madame Grandoni was silent a time; then she looked at the Captain with a gravity which might have been impressive to him had not his accomplished jauntiness suggested an insensibility to that sort of influence. “What then does Christina deserve?” she asked with solemnity.
“Whatever she may get; whatever in the future may make her suffer. But it won’t be the loss of her reputation. She’s too distinguished.”
“You English are strange. Is it because she’s a princess?” Madame Grandoni reflected audibly.
“Oh dear no, her princedom’s nothing here. We can easily beat that. But we can’t beat——!” And he had a pause.
“What then?” his companion asked.
“Well, the perfection of her indifference to public opinion and the unaffectedness of her originality; the sort of thing by which she has bedevilled me.”
“Oh you!” Madame Grandoni tossed off.
“If you think so poorly of me why did you say just now that you were glad to see me?” Sholto demanded in a moment.
“Because you make another person in the house, and that’s more regular; the situation is by so much less—what did you call it?—eccentric. Nun,” she presently went on, “so long as you’re here I won’t go off.”