se who read don't buy. But tell me--" Again the
corners of his mouth drooped, and again his spectacles were adjusted.
"Why did you go in for--for living in a run-down place and meeting such
odds and ends as they say you meet? You're not old enough for things
of that kind. An ugly woman, uninteresting, unprovided for--she might
take them up." He stared at me as if for physical explanation of
unreasonable peculiarities. "You believe, I fancy--"

"That a woman is capable of deciding for herself what she wants to do."

Again Jack Peebles's near-sighted eyes blinked at me, but in his voice
there was no longer chaffing. "She believes even more remarkable
things than that. Believes if people, all sorts, knew one another
better, understood one another better, there would be less injustice,
less indifference, and greater friendship and regard. Rather an
uncomfortable creed for those who don't want to know, who prefer--"

"But you don't expect all grades of people to be friends? Surely you
don't expect--"

I smiled. "No, I don't expect. So far I'm only hoping all people may,
some day--be friendly."

Kitty was signaling frantically with her eyes, and in obedience I again
performed as requested, for the third time turned to Mr. Garrott.

"I heard a most interesting discussion the other day concerning certain
present-day French writers. I wonder if you agree with Bernard Shaw
that Brieux is the greatest dramatist since Moliere, or if--"

"I never agree with Bernard Shaw."

Mr. Garrott frowned, and, taking up his wine-glass, drained it.
Putting it down, he again stared at me. "I don't understand you. You
don't look at all as I imagined you would."

At the foot of the table Billy was insisting upon the superiority of
the links of the Hawthorne to those of the Essex club, and Kitty, at
her end, was giving a lively account of a wedding-party she had come
across at the station the evening before when seeing a friend off for
her annual trip South, and at first one and then the other Mr. Garrott
looked, as if not comprehending why, when he wished to speak, there
should be chatter. Later, when again we were in the drawing-room, he
continued to eye me speculatively, but he was permitted no opportunity
to add to his inquiries; and when at last he was gone Kitty sat down,
limp and worn at the strain she had been forced to endure.

"What business is it of his how you live and what you do?" she said,
indignantly. "He'