“I have come,” said Miss Leland, “to tell John that he must learn to paint. Music and society are not enough. There is nothing like art to give refinement.” Then turning to John Sherman—“My dear, I will make you quite different. You are a dreadful barbarian, you know.”
“What ails me, Margaret?”
“Just look at that necktie! Nothing shows a man’s cultivation like his necktie. Then your reading! You never read anything but old books nobody wants to talk about. I will lend you three every one has read this month. You really must acquire small talk and change your necktie.”
Presently she noticed the photograph-book lying open on a chair.
“Oh!” she cried, “I must have another look at John’s beauties.”
It was a habit of his to gather all manner of pretty faces. It came from incipient old bachelorhood, perhaps.
Margaret criticized each photo in turn with, “Ah! she looks as if she had some life in her!” or, “I do not like your sleepy eyelids,” or some such phrase. The mere relations were passed by without a word. One face occurred several times—a quiet face. As Margaret came on this one for the third time, Mrs. Sherman, who seemed a little resentful about something, said—
“That is his friend, Mary Carton.”
“He told me about her. He has a book she gave him. So that is she? How interesting! I pity these poor country people. It must be hard to keep from getting stupid.”