'No right-minded woman would endorse this opinion of our sex, I am assured.'

Miss Hurdell laughed at Eveline's gravity, and refilled their cups of dragon-blue china.

'I always hated the idea of being married,' said she.

'Why?' asked Eveline.

'Because it would make life—I thought—so tame.'

'How odd!'

'Ah, no doubt you think so. I didn't care about being engaged and all that sort of thing; but no, I never would have married.'

Sooth to say, she had never had an offer, or been engaged, in her life.

'It is so nice to be a fiancée—the object of daily attention.'

'Then you must have been engaged to know all this, Miss Hurdell.'