"No," she said, "Miss Austen."
I asked whether he had made Mrs. Lennox's acquaintance. Yes, they had talked a little.
"Aunt Netty talked to him about Tolstoi. Tolstoi is one of Mr. Rudd's stock topics."
I said I supposed she had retailed Rudd's views on the Russian. Was he astonished?
"Not a bit. I could see he had heard it all before," she said. "He was angelic. He shook his ears now and then like an Airedale terrier. Aunt Netty doesn't want him. Mr. Rudd is enough for her and she is enjoying herself. She always finds someone here. Last year it was a composer."
"Does Princess Kouragine know him?" I asked.
No, she didn't. She had never met him, but she knew of him.
I asked what Mr. Rudd thought about Princess Kouragine.
"Mr. Rudd and Aunt Netty discuss her for hours. He has theories about her. He began by saying she had the Slav indifference. Then Aunt Netty said she was French. But Mr. Rudd said it was catching. People who lived in Ireland became Irish, and people who lived in Russia became Russian. Then Aunt Netty said Princess Kouragine had lived in France and Italy. Mr. Rudd said she had caught the microbe, and that she was a woman who lived only by half-hours. He meant she was only alive for half-an-hour at a time."
At that moment someone walked up the path.