“It’s so stunning, Fliss, that it almost makes me feel a bit guilty. We mustn’t get so greedy for this sort of thing that we forget what I came down here for.”
“You remember all that,” broke in Fliss, returning to the drawing-room. “I’ll remember this part.”
Matthew listened to her as she stood greeting her guests with that little air of dignified deference and again as she sat opposite him, but rather far distant, listening, watching, always at work.
“Not many of your colleagues bring such young and beautiful women to Washington as you did,” commented his neighbor on the left.
Matthew smiled appreciatively.
“My wife may be my greatest contribution to Washington.”
“We hear good things of you already,” said the lady, who was elderly and kindly and had a fine Philadelphia manner. “But one of the best things we can hear is to hear of such devotion. It is good to see a man in love with his wife these days, Mr. Allenby.”
“Do you think it’s so rare?”
“I think we are creating an atmosphere in which it is harder to preserve simple emotions. I want to know your wife better and find out how she manages to be so skillful in so many things at such an early age.”
“Perhaps she won’t betray her secrets. But I will tell you a little. She does it because she is untiring and loves fine and beautiful things so much that she will do anything to obtain them.”