"Let us," said Marie Caton, "talk about fishing."
General Argyle chuckled. "Black doesn't think you know anything about fishing. He has to acknowledge that Mrs. Josslyn does—but then he thinks that she's a charming lusus naturæ. I like to hear you give it to Black. Pay him back. He's always giving it to me!"
"That's right!" said Black. "Pitch into me! Cover me with obloquy! Poor homeless, friendless sailor with the pole star mysteriously shifted from its place—" ...
"The homeless, friendless sailor stayed a long time, even with the pole star shifted," remarked Marie, forty minutes later.
"I certainly didn't mean to be rude," murmured Elizabeth, her eyes upon the disappearing guests, now well on their way to the bowling-alley. "They mean you never to resent a thing which they would at once recognize for an impertinence if one of themselves said it to another—"
"Oh, I shouldn't dub you rude," said the other. "And if he found you uncomfortable for a minute, you made up for it afterwards! You were charming enough, just as charming as if the pole star had never shifted. He went off still in mind the Eastern King."
"Ah," said Elizabeth, "that is where all of us are weak. We say the truth, and then we bring in 'charm' and sandpaper it away again! It's going to take another generation, Marie!"
"Another?" said Marie. "A dozen, more like!—Now I suppose I can read 'The Doll's House' in peace.—No, by all that's fated in this place, here comes another guest!"
This was Ralph Coltsworth, but he made no long tarrying; he was as transient as a butterfly. "Have you ladies seen Hagar Ashendyne? I want her to go to walk with me, and I can't find her anywhere."