o gave the idea that she wanted to be
elegant and moral and a _femme du monde_ and all that sort of trash. Of
course that put people off, when they were only thinking of the real
right way. Didn't she know, Miriam herself, that this was the one thing
to think of? But any one would be kind to her mother who knew what a
dear she was. "She doesn't know when any thing's right or wrong, but
she's a perfect saint," said the girl, obscuring considerably her
vindication. "She doesn't mind when I say things over by the hour,
dinning them into her ears while she sits there and reads. She's a
tremendous reader; she's awfully up in literature. She taught me
everything herself. I mean all that sort of thing. Of course I'm not so
fond of reading; I go in for the book of life." Sherringham wondered if
her mother had not at any rate taught her that phrase--he thought it
highly probable. "It would give on _my_ nerves, the life I lead her,"
Miriam continued; "but she's really a delicious woman."

The oddity of this epithet made Peter laugh, and altogether, in a few
minutes, which is perhaps a sign that he abused his right to be a man of
moods, the young lady had produced in him a revolution of curiosity, set
his sympathy in motion. Her mixture, as it spread itself before him, was
an appeal and a challenge: she was sensitive and dense, she was
underbred and fine. Certainly she was very various, and that was rare;
quite not at this moment the heavy-eyed, frightened creature who had
pulled herself together with such an effort at Madame Carre's, nor the
elated "phenomenon" who had just been declaiming, nor the rather
affected and contradictious young person with whom he had walked home
from the Rue de Constantinople. Was this succession of phases a sign she
was really a case of the celebrated artistic temperament, the nature
that made people provoking and interesting? That Sherringham himself was
of this shifting complexion is perhaps proved by his odd capacity for
being of two different minds very nearly at the same time. Miriam was
pretty now, with felicities and graces, with charming, unusual eyes.
Yes, there were things he could do for her; he had already forgotten the
chill of Mr. Nash's irony, of his prophecy. He was even scarce conscious
how little in general he liked hints, insinuations, favours asked
obliquely and plaintively: that was doubtless also because the girl was
suddenly so taking and so fraternising. Perhaps indeed it was u