"How very quaint—and how squdgy!" she said. "I am afraid you are a Cave Man."
"What is that?"
"Some other girls and I," explained Miss Babs, "have a sort of little society of our own, called the Idealists. Our séances are simply too thrilling. We sit on cushions round the floor and smoke Russian cigarettes and drink the most divine liqueurs—pink or green or gold—and have the duckiest little debates."
Philip, dumbly gripping the tube of French pastry, gaped, quite frankly. This eccentric young female was an entirely new type to him.
"What do you debate about?" he asked respectfully, sipping his tea, which by this time was stone cold.
"Oh," said Miss Babs vaguely, "subconscious influences, and soul-harmonies, and things like that. We divide men and women into various classes. Men like you are Cave Men. Most of the Cave Men I know are soldiers. Then there are Soul Men—actors, and musicians. Then creatures who do nothing but crawl about in beautiful clothes are Thing Men. Men with shiny faces and hot hands are Butter Men. We divide women differently. Most of them are Impossibles, but there are a good many All-Buts. Life is so varied. The human soul, with all its infinite shades of colour—"
Philip, quite intoxicated by the exotic atmosphere in which he found himself, bit heavily and incautiously into the roll of pastry. Straightway from either end there sprang a long and sinuous jet of clotted cream. The rearmost section shot violently down his own throat, nearly choking him; that in front descended upon the inlaid parquet floor in a tubular cascade, where it formed an untidy and conspicuous ant-hill.
In a moment one of Miss Duncombe's daintily-shod feet slid forward, her skimpy skirt forming a promontory which effectually hid the disaster from the eyes of others—especially Lady Rendle.
"Mop it up quickly," she said in an excited whisper. "Take your handkerchief—anything! No one will see." She spoke breathlessly, with all the zeal of a faithful sister screening a delinquent small brother from the wrath to come.
Philip, as he bent confusedly down to clear up the mess, recognised with genuine pleasure that for all her soulfulness and pose Miss Babs Duncombe was nothing more, after all, than a jolly little schoolgirl suffering from a bad attack of adolescence.