"What an incident for a best-seller!" said I. "Fancy the fury of the female critic! Imagine the rage of the 'good woman'!"
"You are satirical, Don Michael."
"Doesn't satire amuse you?"
"I adore it."
"Nothing," said I, "so angers ignorance as satire, because it is not understood, and ignorance becomes suspicious when it does not understand anything. Ignorance mistakes dullness for depth. That is why dull books are so widely read.
"There is, in America, Thusis, a vast desert inhabited by 'authors' who produce illiterature.
"Similar deserts, though less in area, exist in other sections of America. By its ear-marks, however, I guess that this book was 'authorized' somewhere west of Chicago. Don't read it. Only 'a good woman' could enjoy it."
Thusis laughed. "Don't you admire good women and critics?"
"The American critic," said I, "is usually female but not necessarily feminine in sex. It is what is reverently known as 'a good woman'—and like a truffle-hound its nose for immorality is so keen that it can discover a bad smell where there isn't any."
Thusis threw back her head and yielded to laughter unrestrained.