nodded to Erskine, looked without recognition at Gertrude, whose frosty
stillness repudiated Lady Brandon's implication that the stranger was
acquainted with her, and turned to Agatha, to whom he bowed. She made no
sign; she was paralyzed. Lady Brandon reddened with anger. Sir Charles
noted his guest's reception with secret satisfaction, but shared the
embarrassment which oppressed all present except Trefusis, who seemed
quite indifferent and assured, and unconsciously produced an impression
that the others had not been equal to the occasion, as indeed they had
not.

"We were looking at some etchings when you came in," said Sir Charles,
hastening to break the silence. "Do you care for such things?" And he
handed him a proof.

Trefusis looked at it as if he had never seen such a thing before and
did not quite know what to make of it. "All these scratches seem to me
to have no meaning," he said dubiously.

Sir Charles stole a contemptuous smile and significant glance at
Erskine. He, seized already with an instinctive antipathy to Trefusis,
said emphatically:

"There is not one of those scratches that has not a meaning."

"That one, for instance, like the limb of a daddy-long-legs. What does
that mean?"

Erskine hesitated a moment; recovered himself; and said: "Obviously
enough--to me at least--it indicates the marking of the roadway."

"Not a bit of it," said Trefusis. "There never was such a mark as that
on a road. It may be a very bad attempt at a briar, but briars don't
straggle into the middle of roads frequented as that one seems to
be--judging by those overdone ruts." He put the etching away, showing no
disposition to look further into the portfolio, and remarked, "The only
art that interests me is photography."

Erskine and Sir Charles again exchanged glances, and the former said:

"Photography is not an art in the sense in which I understand the term.
It is a process."

"And a much less troublesome and more perfect process than that," said
Trefusis, pointing to the etching. "The artists are sticking to the old
barbarous, difficult, and imperfect processes of etching and portrait
painting merely to keep up the value of their monopoly of the required
skill. They have left the new, more complexly organized, and more
perfect, yet simple and beautiful method of photography in the hands
of tradesmen, sneering at it publicly and resorting to its aid
surreptitiously. The result is that the tradesmen are becomi