"I guess," said a fair American, surveying the company, "that we're a good-looking crowd round this table. And, among all the women, I have a conviction that I go up for the beauty prize. I have had to hug that conviction in secret for a very long time, and now it's out."
Thus and thus was the House of Truth built up stone by stone, and Aunt Sarah's position was pitiable. Hitherto she had made her mark in whatever society she found herself by sheer insistence on her right to be frankly and critically disagreeable. On any ordinary occasion she would have had the whole tableful of young people prostrate under the terror of her biting tongue, and not a whit would she have cared for consequent unpopularity so long as she had made herself acknowledged as the dominating spirit of the assembly. Now she was met and foiled by the dexterous use of the very weapons which she had wielded so long and so unmercifully, and no arrogant speech could she make but its sting was removed by an equally outspoken reply.
Thus, to her right-hand neighbour, a young man with smooth black hair and a preternaturally solemn face: "I don't know who you are, but by your long upper lip I should judge you to be a Mortimer."
"My name and appearance are both undoubtedly Mortimer," he replied, gravely. "My character, I am happy to say, is not."
"Perhaps you do not know," said Aunt Sarah, "that I am a Mortimer?"
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"'I WILL NOT STAND THIS INSOLENT BEHAVIOUR ANY LONGER,' SHE SAID."
"I am perfectly aware of it," was the answer. "It would cost me half a crown to congratulate you on the fact."
"And may I ask what fault you have to find with the family whose name you have the honour of bearing?"