th plates, cups,
jugs, a cold teapot, crumbs, and the general litter of the entertainment
turned her head towards us.

"You see, Mr. Marlow," she said in an unexpectedly confidential tone:
"they are so utterly unsuited for each other."

At the moment I did not know how to apply this remark. I thought at
first of Fyne and the dog. Then I adjusted it to the matter in hand
which was neither more nor less than an elopement. Yes, by Jove! It was
something very much like an elopement--with certain unusual
characteristics of its own which made it in a sense equivocal. With
amused wonder I remembered that my sagacity was requisitioned in such a
connection. How unexpected! But we never know what tests our gifts may
be put to. Sagacity dictated caution first of all. I believe caution to
be the first duty of sagacity. Fyne sat down as if preparing himself to
witness a joust, I thought.

"Do you think so, Mrs. Fyne?" I said sagaciously. "Of course you are in
a position . . . " I was continuing with caution when she struck out
vivaciously for immediate assent.

"Obviously! Clearly! You yourself must admit . . . "

"But, Mrs. Fyne," I remonstrated, "you forget that I don't know your
brother."

This argument which was not only sagacious but true, overwhelmingly true,
unanswerably true, seemed to surprise her.

I wondered why. I did not know enough of her brother for the remotest
guess at what he might be like. I had never set eyes on the man. I
didn't know him so completely that by contrast I seemed to have known
Miss de Barral--whom I had seen twice (altogether about sixty minutes)
and with whom I had exchanged about sixty words--from the cradle so to
speak. And perhaps, I thought, looking down at Mrs. Fyne (I had remained
standing) perhaps she thinks that this ought to be enough for a sagacious
assent.

She kept silent; and I looking at her with polite expectation, went on
addressing her mentally in a mood of familiar approval which would have
astonished her had it been audible: You my dear at any rate are a sincere
woman . . . "

"I call a woman sincere," Marlow began again after giving me a cigar and
lighting one himself, "I call a woman sincere when she volunteers a
statement resembling remotely in form what she really would like to say,
what she really thinks ought to be said if it were not for the necessity
to spare the stupid sensitiveness of men. The women's rougher, simpler,
more upright judgme