desired
introduction. For reasons of his own, he made no mention of his earlier
acquaintance with Elgar. Did she know of it? In any case she appeared
not to, but spoke of things which did not interest Mr. Bickerdike in
the least. At length he was driven to bring forward the one subject on
which he desired her views.

"Have you, by chance, read my book, Mrs. Elgar?"

M. Silvenoire would have understood her smile; the Englishman thought
it merely amiable, and prepared for the accustomed compliment.

"Yes, I have read it, Mr. Bickerdike. It seemed to me a charmingly
written romance."

The novelist, seated upon too low a chair, leaning forward so that his
knees and chin almost touched, was not in himself a very graceful
object; the contrast with his neighbour made him worse than grotesque.
His visage was disagree ably animal as it smiled with condescension.

"You mean something by that," he remarked, with awkward attempt at
light fencing.

There was barely a perceptible movement of Cecily's brows.

"I try to mean something as often as I speak," she said, in an amused
tone.

"In this ease it is a censure. You take the side of those who find
fault with my idealism."

"Not so; I simply form my own judgment."

Mr. Bickerdike was nervous at all times in the society of a refined
woman; Mrs. Elgar's quiet rebuke brought the perspiration to his
forehead, and made him rub his hands together. Like many a better man,
he could not do justice to the parts he really possessed, save when
sitting in solitude with a sheet of paper before him. Though he had a
confused perception that Mrs. Elgar was punishing him for forcing her
to speak of his book, he was unable to change the topic and so win her
approval for his tact. In the endeavour to seem at ease, he became
blunt.

"And what has your judgment to say on the subject?"

"I think I have already told you, Mr. Bickerdike."

"You mean by a romance a work that is not soiled with the common
realism of to-day."

"I am willing to mean that."

"But you will admit, Mrs. Elgar, that my mode of fiction has as much to
say for itself as that which you prefer?"

"In asking for one admission you take for granted another. That is a
little confusing."

It was made sufficiently so to Mr. Bickerdike. He thrust out his long
legs, and exclaimed:

"I should be grateful to you if you would tell me what your view of the
question really is--I mean, of the question at issue between the two