"'She has more refinement than that,' I can hear you say.
"Refinement, yes. Flowers do not grow with their roots uppermost, but we know they have roots all the same. Her social smile is a very guileless plant, but I detect how far its ramifications extend.
"Her second shelf is scarcely better, it is for the mothers, mild brooding creatures whose brains perform kaleidoscopic revolutions with the same materia—dinner menus, infant food, servants' industries, and wardrobe renovations. 'The idea,' she would say, 'of a woman earning her share of the family income, contributing three hundred or so to the housekeeping instead of saving! It is unconventional, and, consequently, bad form.'
"And the last shelf is for the matrons, dowagers, chaperones—middlewomen of the matrimonial market like her dear misguided self—social seals of respectability stamped with the impress of a Buckingham Palace curtsy; godmothers for the distribution of hall-marked silver and hall-marked morality, dragons——. But I forget your friend, the poet. Of course he thought I was 'trotted out;' of course I hated him for thinking it. I pretended never to have heard of him or read his works. Literature was practically barred, for I confessed I loathed poets. He agreed, quoted Coventry Patmore, who says a poet is one degree removed from a saint—or Balaam's ass. Well, men saints are chilly, and donkeys are troublesome, and kick. I told him so. Yet I abhor compromises! I can't say what I do care for; certainly not being thrown at men's heads like stale eggs at election time!
"And what do you think we talked of?
"Not the modern girl, you may be sure. Mr Lorraine is romantic, and thinks that intelligent women are bound to be ill-shod, splay-waisted, and brusque. I had half a mind to undeceive him, but he might have imagined I was accentuating my points. We talked of all sorts of things—neutral things. I believe we should have liked each other had I been some nice young married woman with a red star for 'Sold' dabbed on my frame. We always admire pictures that are so ticketed, don't we?—from sheer perversity, I suppose.
"I ate a huge tea. Byron hated women with healthy appetites; I daresay Mr Lorraine does the same. He watched the muffins and the cakes disappear with an almost zoological interest. I was on the verge of inquiring if he ever visited the lions at feeding time—but a song interposed.
"During this I intuitively felt his eye exploring, 'totting me up,' so to speak.
"Vaudin, the tenor, was singing exquisitely. The words were from Mr Lorraine's last book—they were beautiful, and I knew every line, but affected ignorance.
"'What is that tune?' I questioned with vulgar simplicity.