“Well,” said Knight, reflecting a moment, “I mean by nothing in them those who don’t care about anything solid. This is an instance: I knew a man who had a young friend in whom he was much interested; in fact, they were going to be married. She was seemingly poetical, and he offered her a choice of two editions of the British poets, which she pretended to want badly. He said, ‘Which of them would you like best for me to send?’ She said, ‘A pair of the prettiest earrings in Bond Street, if you don’t mind, would be nicer than either.’ Now I call her a girl with not much in her but vanity; and so do you, I daresay.”
“Oh yes,” replied Elfride with an effort.
Happening to catch a glimpse of her face as she was speaking, and noticing that her attempt at heartiness was a miserable failure, he appeared to have misgivings.
“You, Miss Swancourt, would not, under such circumstances, have preferred the nicknacks?”
“No, I don’t think I should, indeed,” she stammered.
“I’ll put it to you,” said the inflexible Knight. “Which will you have of these two things of about equal value—the well-chosen little library of the best music you spoke of—bound in morocco, walnut case, lock and key—or a pair of the very prettiest earrings in Bond Street windows?”
“Of course the music,” Elfride replied with forced earnestness.
“You are quite certain?” he said emphatically.
“Quite,” she faltered; “if I could for certain buy the earrings afterwards.”
Knight, somewhat blamably, keenly enjoyed sparring with the palpitating mobile creature, whose excitable nature made any such thing a species of cruelty.