'I was sure you would think so,' said Cicely Hamlin, glancing first at the Senator then at her aunt. 'I wish you would read it, Aunt Eleanor.'
'Hm!' remarked that formidable person, planting her own gold-rimmed glasses firmly astride her rugged nose just above the point where it bent sharply downward, picking up the paper, then lowering it to gaze with a hint of habitual, impersonal severity at her niece.
'Even so,' she said. 'Suppose the young man has gifts. That will hardly make it necessary for you to cultivate him. I gather he's a bad lot.'
'I have no intention of cultivating him,' replied Cicely, moving toward the door, but pausing by the mantel to pat her dark ample hair into place. She wore it low on her shapely neck. Cicely was wearing a simple-appearing, far from inexpensive blue frock.
Madame Watt read the opening sentence of The Caliph of Simpson Street, then lowered the paper again.
'Are you going out, Cicely?'
'No, I expect company here.'
'Who is coming?'
The girl compressed her lips for an instant, then:—
'Elberforce Jenkins.'