"Look here, Miss Beaminster—I wish you'd help me about things I'm an ass in. You can, you know—I'd be most awfully glad."
"What," she said, turning round and facing him, "are the things you really care about?"
"The things? ... care about?"
"Yes—really——"
"Well! Oh! animals and bein' out in the open and shootin' and ridin' and fishin'—any old exercise—and comin' up to town for a buck every now and again, and then goin' back and seein' no one, and my old place and—oh! I don't know," he ended.
"You wouldn't tell anyone a lie, would you, about things you liked and didn't like?"
"It wouldn't be much use if I did," he said, laughing. "They'd find me out in a minute——"
"No, but would you? If you were with a number of people who thought art the thing to care about and knew nothing about dogs and horses, would you say you cared about art more than anything?"
"No," he said slowly. "No—but sometimes, you see, pictures and music and such do please me—like anything—I can't put into words, but I might suddenly be in any old mood—for pictures, or your uncle's fans, or dogs or the Empire or these jolly old stars—Why, there, you see I just let it go on—the mood, I mean, till it's over——" Then he added with a great sigh, "But I am a dash fool at explainin'——"
"But I know you wouldn't be like Mr. Garden or Mr. Carfax—just pretending not to like the thing because it's the thing not to. Or like Aunt Adela, who picks up a phrase about a book or picture from some clever man and then uses it everywhere."