"How horrid of you to doubt my powers! Why, why will nobody believe I have anything in me?"
She brought the words out with a force that was almost vicious. As she said them it happened that Claude Heath turned a little. His eyes travelled down the room and met hers. Perhaps her mother had just been speaking to him of her, had been making some assertion about her. For he seemed to look at her with inquiry.
When Charmian turned away her eyes from his she added to Max Elliot:
"But what does it matter? Because people, some people, can't see a thing, that doesn't prove that it has no existence. And I don't really care what people think of me."
"This—to your old friend!"
"Yes. And besides, I expect one must possess to discover."
Her voice was almost complacent.
"You deal in enigmas to-night."
"One ought to carry a light when one goes into a cave to seek for gold."
But Elliot would not let her see that he had from the first fully understood her impertinence.