‘That is a new accomplishment,’ was as much as I felt I could say with dignity, and she responded:
‘Yes, isn’t it?’
I felt some slight indignation on Lady Pilkey’s account. ‘Do you really think you ought to do things like that at the eleventh hour?’ I asked, but Dora smiled at a glance, the hypocrisy out of my face.
‘What does anything matter?’ she demanded.
I knew perfectly well the standard by which nothing mattered, and there was no use, of course, in going on pretending that I did not.
‘I assured him that you didn’t paint,’ I said, accusingly.
‘Oh, I had to—otherwise what was there to go upon? He would have been found only to be lost again. You did not contemplate that?’ Miss Harris inquired sweetly.
‘I should have thought it was the surest way of losing him.’
‘I can’t think why you should be so rude. He observes progress already.’
‘With a view to claiming and holding him, would it be of any use,’ I asked, ‘for me to start in oils?’