Grace. [Whispering to Sudley.] Cynthia's coming.
[He doesn't hear.
Cynthia comes in, absorbed in reading a newspaper. She is a young creature in her twenties, small and high-bred, full of the love of excitement and sport. Her manner is wide-awake and keen, and she is evidently in no fear of the opinion of others. Her dress is exceedingly elegant, but with the elegance of a woman whose chief interests lie in life out of doors. There is nothing hard or masculine in her style, and her expression is youthful and ingenuous.
Sudley. [Sententious and determinately epigrammatic.] The uncouth modern young woman, eight feet high, with a skin like a rhinoceros and manners like a cave-dweller—an habitué of the race-track and the divorce court—
Grace. [Aside to Sudley.] Cousin William!
Sudley. Eh, oh!
Cynthia. [Reading her newspaper, advances into the room, immersed, excited, trembling. She lowers paper to catch the light.] "Belmont favourite—six to one—Rockaway—Rosebud, and Flying Cloud. Slow track—raw wind—h'm, h'm, h'm—At the half, Rockaway forged ahead, when Rosebud under the lash made a bold bid for victory—neck by neck—for a quarter—when Flying Cloud slipped by the pair and won on the post by a nose in one forty nine!" [Speaking with the enthusiasm of a sport.] Oh, I wish I'd seen the dear thing do it. Oh, it's Mr. Sudley! You must think me very rude. How do you do, Mr. Sudley?
[Going over to Sudley.
Sudley. [Bowing without cordiality.] Mrs. Karslake.
[Cynthia pauses, feeling he should say something. As he says nothing, she speaks again.