Mrs. Maturin laughed. But Insall waved his hand deprecatingly.
"That isn't my own," he confessed. "I cribbed it from a clever
Englishman. But I believe it's true."
"I think I'll adopt her," said Mrs. Maturin to Insall, when she had repeated to him the conversation. "I know you are always convicting me of enthusiasms, Brooks, and I suppose I do get enthusiastic."
"Well, you adopt her—and I'll marry her," replied Insall, with a smile, as he cut the string from the last bundle of clothing.
"You might do worse. It would be a joke if you did—!"
His friend paused to consider this preposterous possibility. "One never can tell whom a man like you, an artist, will marry."
"We've no business to marry at all," said Insall, laughing. "I often wonder where that romantic streak will land you, Augusta. But you do have a delightful time!"
"Don't begrudge it me, it makes life so much more interesting," Mrs. Maturin begged, returning his smile. "I haven't the faintest idea that you will marry her or any one else. But I insist on saying she's your type—she's the kind of a person artists do dig up and marry—only better than most of them, far better."
"Dig up?" said Insall.
"Well, you know I'm not a snob—I only mean that she seems to be one of the surprising anomalies that sometimes occur in—what shall I say?—in the working-classes. I do feel like a snob when I say that. But what is it? Where does that spark come from? Is it in our modern air, that discontent, that desire, that thrusting forth toward a new light —something as yet unformulated, but which we all feel, even at small institutions of learning like Silliston?"