“Nine.”
“Exactly; nine. Well, the girlish extravagant language comes cropping out first, until you get stimulated into thinking grown-up thoughts. Then your very vocabulary changes. Your remark that Whitman is super-moral, for instance, is a summing-up of the man. No youngster could have gotten that so neatly without——”
“Stuff!” she laughed. “I cribbed that for my Woman’s Club essay. How do you suppose those club essays are gotten up!”
“Of course you would affect modesty naturally; although it’s a mistake. When you’ve done a good thing you should own up. But all that’s neither here nor there. If you hadn’t come along I’d made up my mind to slip off the boat after luncheon—I couldn’t afford to risk buying a meal; I’m so extravagant—and do the Museo in time for the boat dinner at six. There! I’ve been very frank. And, really, I don’t mind if we cut the Museo out of the programme altogether. I have no very deep desires for anything in this world. I’m a terrific loafer.”
“Tell Louis Napoleon up there on the box to drive to that Museo; I’m keen for it,” she commanded.
It was half-past four when they drove up to the door of the museum. A clear sign announced that the institution would close at seven o’clock. And at fifteen minutes after seven o’clock, when they were finally driven from the place, they had hardly advanced beyond the first few rooms of that wonderful collection. It was almost eight o’clock before they found a suitable place to dine.
“Isn’t it a pity,” she said as they waited for the soup, “to leave without seeing those other rooms!”
“Horrible!”
He stared at the full dining-room without seeing anyone. “Horrible,” he repeated, but immediately plucked up a cheerful spirit. “It is something saved for next time.”
“When will that be?”