"Yes," assented Flint, "the heaviness of touch necessary to caricature spoils the effect."
"Precisely," said Brady, "and it is as difficult to take off her looks as her manner. Her expression is too changeable to leave any characteristic fixed in the mind. The fact is, Miss Anstice is almost a beauty at times."
"You think so?" responded Flint, with half-closed eyes.
"Yes, I do really—in a way—not like that Madonna-type of Nora Costello."
"No, certainly not like her."
"But still she has a style of her own."
"Oh, yes, quite so—as you say, she has a style of her own."
"You are very cool on the subject; but you should have heard a man at the club go on about her, when he heard that we had spent our vacation at Nepaug."
"I should scarcely think," said Flint, opening and closing his match-box with a quick, nervous movement, "that you would have allowed her name to come up at the club."
"Oh, hang it, Flint, that is going pretty far! [Pg 231] I don't know that Miss Anstice's name is too sacred to be mentioned in general society; and as for the club,—why, if it is not made up of gentlemen, what did you put me up for?"