“Well, why not, and what of it?”
“Then how about the ‘Pauline’?” said Manning, opening a fresh field of opposition. “None of our girls ’ud do, and they’re all on long contracts.”
“Miss Morries.”
“Tss! She’s ingénue—Sweet Nancy—sun-bonnet and long strings. She’d never get away with that cold-storage class of goods.”
Eliphalet drew patterns on the table-cloth with a long sensitive forefinger.
“It should not be difficult,” he hazarded, “to alter her part as well.”
“If the author consents?”
“That is a point we can decide at half-past four. Please don’t throw any more cold water on the scheme. I am really anxious to be associated with modern thought, and this forceful young man has shown me the way—‘A Man’s Way.’ ”
At precisely four-twenty-nine the forceful young man in question was ringing the bell of Number 15, St. James’s Place, and as the skeleton clock on the half-landing proclaimed the half-hour he was ushered into Mr. Cardomay’s august presence.
If Eliphalet expected to see in Mr. Lennard a pattern of masculine virility he was grievously mistaken. Nothing could have been more ineffective or retiring than the young man’s demeanour.