whom you have
just been talking--an exceptional type."

"An unusual woman, I fancy," was my reply. "But which is Miss Treherne?
I am afraid I am not quite sure."

He described her and her father, with whom I had talked--a London Q.C.,
travelling for his health, a notable man with a taste for science, who
spent his idle hours in reading astronomy and the plays of Euripides.

"Why not include the father in the list of the most interesting
persons?" I questioned.

"Because I have met many men like him, but no one quite like his
daughter, or Mrs.--what is her name?"

"Mrs. Falchion."

"Or Mrs. Falchion or the bookmaker."

"What is there so uncommon about Miss Treherne? She had not struck me as
being remarkable."

"No? Well, of course, she is not striking after the fashion of Mrs.
Falchion. But watch her, study her, and you will find her to be the
perfection of a type--the finest expression of a decorous convention, a
perfect product of social conservatism; unaffected, cheerful, sensitive,
composed, very talented, altogether companionable."

"Excuse me," I said, laughing, though I was impressed; "that sounds as
if you had been writing about her, and applying to her the novelist's
system of analysis, which makes an imperfect individual a perfect type.
Now, frankly, are you speaking of Miss Treherne, or of some one of whom
she is the outline, as it were?"

Clovelly turned and looked at me steadily. "When you consider a
patient," he said, "do you arrange a diagnosis of a type or of a
person?--And, by the way, 'type' is a priggish word."

"I consider the type in connection with the person."

"Exactly. The person is the thing. That clears up the matter of business
and art. But now, as to Miss Treherne: I want to say that, having been
admitted to her acquaintance and that of her father, I have thought of
them only as friends, and not as 'characters' or 'copy.'"

"I beg your pardon, Clovelly," said I. "I might have known."

"Now, to prove how magnanimous I am, I shall introduce you to Miss
Treherne, if you will let me. You've met her father, I suppose?" he
added, and tossed his cigar overboard.

"Yes, I have talked with him. He is a courteous and able man, I should
think."

We rose. Presently he continued: "See, Miss Treherne is sitting there
with the Tasmanian widow--what is HER name?"

"Mrs. Callendar," I replied. "Blackburn, the Queenslander, is joining
them."

"So much the better," he said. "Come on."