“I’m very proud of my crest,” continued Mrs. Winnie. “Of course there are vulgar rich people who have them made to order, and make them ridiculous; but ours is a real one. It’s my own—not my husband’s; the Duvals are an old French family, but they’re not noble. I was a Morris, you know, and our line runs back to the old French ducal house of Montmorenci. And last summer, when we were motoring, I hunted up one of their chateaux; and see! I brought over this.”
Mrs. Winnie pointed to a suit of armour, placed in a passage leading to the billiard-room. “I have had the lights fixed,” she added. And she pressed a button, and all illumination vanished, save for a faint red glow just above the man in armour.
“Doesn’t he look real?” said she. (He had his visor down, and a battle-axe in his mailed hands.) “I like to imagine that he may have been my twentieth great-grandfather. I come and sit here, and gaze at him and shiver. Think what a terrible time it must have been to live in—when men wore things like that! It couldn’t be any worse to be a crab.”
“You seem to be fond of strange emotions,” said Montague, laughing.
“Maybe I am,” said the other. “I like everything that’s old and romantic, and makes you forget this stupid society world.”
She stood brooding for a moment or two, gazing at the figure. Then she asked, abruptly, “Which do you like best, pictures or swimming?”
“Why,” replied the man, laughing and perplexed, “I like them both, at times.”
“I wondered which you’d rather see first,” explained his escort; “the art gallery or the natatorium. I’m afraid you’ll get tired before you’ve seen every thing.”
“Suppose we begin with the art-gallery,” said he. “There’s not much to see in a swimming-pool.”
“Ah, but ours is a very special one,” said the lady.—“And some day, if you’ll be very good, and promise not to tell anyone, I’ll let you see my own bath. Perhaps they’ve told you, I have one in my own apartments, cut out of a block of the most wonderful green marble.”