"I do want a couple of hats," she said, with the worldly yet childish naïveté of her class; "I'm going to Bristol in panto—at Christmas, you know."
"I'll come down."
She was conscienceless, like the rest of her type. She knew, her observation had told her long ago, that this man had ties, domestic relations, duties; all of which mattered nothing to her. Before her wants and desires, momentary though they might be, all considerations flew like thistledown before strong wind.
A Nero among women, like the rest of her pleasure-sisters, she was planned for destruction and she went upon her way destroying. The loudest cry could not reach her, nor the greatest sorrow touch her; nor could broken hearts block the path to the most fleeting of her desires.
She cared not who wept; as she had no faith, nor power for pity, so she had no tears.
She took Osborn Kerr into her hands.
She said idly, to pass the time, but softly, just as if there was some meaning behind the question: "What made you think there was anyone else, dear?"
He looked at her and spoke rather hoarsely, under the influence of the matter in hand: "Oh well; there might have been. Roselle, do you think you can love me?"
"I could," she answered. She assimilated the details of a near-by toilette. "But—"
"Don't let's have any 'buts.'"