"Are you unaccustomed to thinking?" she asked too innocently; and he reddened again.
"Stop tormenting him," said Silvette, pouring herself more tea. "You're a tease, Diane."
"You both seem a little in that way," he suggested; "you jeer at me and then look pained, and tell each other to stop."
"We're too intelligent," said Silvette calmly; "that's the trouble with us; and when, by degrees, we add a little more experience to our intelligence we'll be either exceedingly unpopular or—successfully married."
"Why those terrible alternatives?" he asked, laughing.
"Because the man who is able to endure us will probably be worth the bother of marrying—when we've finished dissecting him. We don't know just how to dissect men yet, but we're rapidly learning. It's only a matter of practice and experience."
He laughed again, and so did Silvette, but Diana scarcely smiled, lying back in her velvet armchair and watching Edgerton and her sister alternately with grave, incurious eyes.
"How old are you, anyway?" he said, looking straight at her.
"Twenty-seven," she answered calmly. "Don't jump, please."
"What!" he exclaimed incredulously.