Mrs. All. Then you would have met Lady NEURALINE MENTHOL She was ordered there, I happen to know.
Mrs. Ard. Really, you don't say so? Lady NEURALINE! Well, that's the first I've heard of it. (It is also the first time she has heard of HER, but she trusts to be spared so humiliating an admission.)
Mrs. All. It's a fact, I can assure you. You know her, perhaps?
Mrs. Ard. (who would dearly like to say she does, if she only dared). Well, I can hardly say I exactly know her. I know of her. I've met her about, and so on. (She tells herself this is quite as likely to be true as not.)
Mrs. All. (who, of course, does not know Lady NEURALINE either). Ah, she is a most delightful person—requires knowing, don't you know.
Mrs. Ard. So many in her position do, don't they? (So far as she is concerned—they ALL do.) You'd think it was haughtiness—but it's really only manner.
Mrs. All. (feeling that she can go ahead with safety now). I have never found anything of that sort in Lady NEURALINE myself (which is perfectly true). She's rather odd and flighty, but quite a dear. By the way, how sad it is about those poor dear CHUTNEYS—the Countess, don't you know!
Mrs. Ard. Ah (as if she knew all the rest of the family), I don't know her at all.
Mrs. All. Such a sweet woman—but the trouble she's had with her eldest boy, Lord MANGO! He married quite beneath him, you know, some girl from the provinces—not a county-family girl even.
Mrs. Ard. (shocked). Dear, dear! not a county family!