“We will stop long enough. I’m so glad to have an excuse for not going back too soon. The country’s stupid in the winter and Brighton’s jolly, although Philip did try to grumble about coming.”
“ ‘Try’ is the word,” rejoined West, biting the end of his cigar; “try! When you get married, Maddison, you’ll remember that little word ‘try.’ ”
“Don’t be naughty, Philip,” said Mrs. West, pouting. “You know you always have your own way, except about grumbling. Life’s too short for grumbling, isn’t it, Mr. Maddison?”
“Much. Your husband as a business man ought to know better than to waste his time.”
“What a prosaic view to take!” Mrs. West answered. “He ought to leave business behind him in the office and just waste his time when he’s at home. But all men are prosaic, I think.”
“And all women are—?” asked West.
“Just what you like to make them,” his wife replied. “That’s the worst of it—what we are depends on what you are.”
“What do you say to such views, Alice?” West said, appealing to Miss Lane, who was looking out of the window at the miles of dreary suburbs flying by.
“Nothing!” she answered. “You know I never theorize about things. What’s the use of it?”
“Practical, steady, unemotional Alice!” laughed Mrs. West; but Maddison knew better, for he caught a glimpse of a look of contemptuous scorn before Miss Lane turned away again to the window.