Bartlett, with a laugh.—"Oh, I don't ask any praise for the discovery. You deserve praise for not making it. It does honour to your good heart. Well, don't be vexed, old fellow. And in trying to improve me on this little point—a weak point, I'll allow, with me—do me the justice to remember that I didn't flaunt my misanthropy, as you call it, in your face; I didn't force my confidence upon you."
Cummings, with compunction.—"I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, Bartlett."
Bartlett.—"Well, you haven't. It's all right."
Cummings, with anxious concern.—"I wish I could think so."
Bartlett, dryly.—"You have my leave—my request, in fact." He takes a turn about the room, thrusting his fingers through the hair on his forehead, and letting it fall in a heavy tangle, and then pulling at either side of his parted beard. In facing away from one of the sofas at the end of the room, he looks back over his shoulder at it, falters, wheels about, and picks up from it a lady's shawl and hat. "Hallo!" He lets the shawl fall again into picturesque folds on the sofa. "This is the spoil of no local beauty, Cummings. Look here; I don't understand this. There has been an arrival."
Cummings, joining his friend in contemplation of the hat and shawl: "Yes; it's an arrival beyond all question. Those are a lady's things. I should think that was a Paris hat." They remain looking at the things some moments in silence.
Bartlett.—"How should a Paris hat get here? I know the landlord wasn't expecting it. But it can't be going to stay; it's here through some caprice. It may be a transient of quality, but it's a transient. I suppose we shall see the young woman belonging to it at dinner." He sets the hat on his fist, and holds it at arm's length from him. "What a curious thing it is about clothes"—
Cummings.—"Don't, Bartlett, don't!"
Bartlett.—"Why?"
Cummings.—"I don't know. It makes me feel as if you were offering an indignity to the young lady herself."