"'That's a capital idea, Felicity.'
"'Then you'll go by yourself, Papa,' I said. 'I'll do some shopping and call for you at the police station on the way home.'
"Well, he abandoned the blinker idea eventually, but stuck to his scheme for concentrating on Sargent, and suddenly I saw how the afternoon might be made both amusing and instructive. So I said, 'There's one thing that's rather pleasing, Papa. You won't have to buy a catalogue, because I've got one. Some people I had tea with yesterday gave me theirs, and I'll bring it if you like.'"
She looked at me mischievously under her long dark lashes.
"You catch the idea?" she asked.
"No," I said, "not yet."
"Well, as soon as we arrived Papa took the catalogue and looked up all the Sargents—in the index part, you know, and wrote the numbers on his cuff and then we began to hunt them down.
"The first one was a 'still life.' Papa viewed it in some perplexity. 'Ah,' he said at length, 'just as I thought. I have been anticipating this for some time.' He adjusted his spectacles. 'The tendency of modern Art—that is to say the best Art—is towards a return to more classic forms. Sargent, as might be expected, leads the way; but he infuses the subject with his own special genius. I regard this as a very line example—very fine, indeed. The vitality of the half salmon is positively amazing.'
"I led him gently away, and presently we stood before the portrait of a City gentleman—the kind that is very fond of turtle soup. Papa raved over it.
"'Here, again,' he pointed out, 'see the loving care bestowed on each link in the watch-chain. What a reproof to the slovenly slap-dash methods of the Impressionists.'