"Oh, really? We are getting on, Mr. Chesney. Let me tell you that I think it is the cleverest modern comedy I have ever seen."
"Yes! In that case you like the part of 'Dorothy Kent?'"
Ethel's dainty color deepened slightly. She glanced suspiciously at the speaker. But he was gazing solidly, stolidly, into space—like a man who had just dined on beef. The idea was too preposterous. The idea of John Chesney chaffing her, chaffing anybody.
"I thought perhaps you did," Chesney went on. "Mr. Kent is a bit of a butterfly, a good sort at the bottom, but decidedly of the species lepidopteræ——"
"Stop!" Ethel cried. "Where did you get that word from? Whence comes it in the vocabulary of a youth—a youth? Oh, you know what I mean."
"I believe it is a general name for insects," Chesney said humbly. "Mrs. Kent is a good sort, but a little conceited. Apt to fancy herself, you know. Young widows of her type often do. She is tired of the artificial existence of town, and goes off into the country, where she leads the simple life. She meets a young man there, who, well, 'pon my word, is rather like me. He was a bit of an ass——"
"He was nothing of the kind," Ethel cried indignantly. "He was splendid. And he made that woman love him, he made her acknowledge that she had met her match at last. And he turned out to be one of the most brilliant——"
"My dear Miss Ethel, after all it was only a play. You remind me of 'Mrs. Kent,' and you say that I remind you of the hero of the play who——"
"I didn't, Mr. Chesney. I said nothing of the kind. It is unfair of you——"
"When the likeness is plain enough," Chesney said stubbornly. "You are 'Mrs. Kent,' and I am the hero of the comedy. Do you think that there is any possibility that some day you and—of course not yet, but——"