To be academic would be
even more fatal to Miss Shirley's ambition than to be tomboyish, and he
thought with pathos of that touch about the Italian nobility in the
Middle Ages, and how little it could have moved the tough fancies of that
crowd of well-groomed young people at the breakfast-table when Mrs.
Westangle brought it out with her ignorant acceptance of it as a social
force. After all, Miss Macroyd was about the only one who could have
felt it in the way it was meant, and she had chosen to smile at it. He
wondered if possibly she could feel the secondary pathos of it as he did.
But to make talk with her he merely asked:
"Do you intend to take part in the fray?"
"Not unless I can be one of the reserve corps that won't need to be
brought up till it's all over. I've no idea of getting my hair down."
"Ah," he sighed, "you think it's going to be rude:"
"That is one of the chances. But you seem to be suffering about it, Mr.
Verrian!" she said, and, of course, she laughed.
"Who? I?" he returned, in the temptation to deny it. But he resisted.
"I always suffer when there's anything silly happening, as if I were
doing it myself. Don't you?"
"No, thank you, I believe not. But perhaps you are doing this? One
can't suppose Mrs. Westangle imagined it.
Pages:
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73