"What is her theory of life?" Alicia demanded, quickly. "I should be glad of a new one."
Lindsay's communicativeness seemed to contract a little, as at the touch of a finger light but cold.
"I don't think she has ever told me," he said. "No, I am sure she has not." His reflection was, "It is her garment—and how could it fit another woman?"
"But you have divined it—she has let you do that! You can give me your impression."
He recognised her bright courage in venturing upon impalpabilities, but not without a shade of embarrassment.
"Perhaps. But having perceived to pass on—it doesn't follow that one can. I don't seem able to lay my hand upon the signs and symbols."
The faintest look of disappointment, the slightest cloud of submission, appeared upon Miss Livingstone's face.
"Oh, I know!" she said. "You are making me feel dreadfully out of it, but I know. It surrounds her like a kind of atmosphere, an intellectual atmosphere. Though I confess that is the part I don't understand in connection with an actress."
There was a sudden indifference in this last sentence. Alicia lay back upon her wolf-skins like a long-stemmed flower cast down among them, and looked away from the subject at the teacups. Duff picked up his hat. He had the subtlest intimations with women.
"It's an intoxicating atmosphere," he said. "My continual wonder is that I'm not in love with her. A fellow in a novel, now, in my situation, would be embroiled with half his female relations by this time, and taking his third refusal with a haggard eye."