won't
do on account of mamma's prejudices?"

"Say this time on account of mine."

"Do you mean because she has lovers?"

"Her lovers are none of our business."

"None of mine, I see. So you've been one of them?"

"No such luck!"

"What a pity!" she richly wailed. "I should have liked to see that. One
must see everything--to be able to do everything." And as he pressed for
what in particular she had wished to see she replied: "The way a woman
like that receives one of the old ones."

Peter gave a groan at this, which was at the same time partly a laugh,
and, turning away to drop on a bench, ejaculated: "You'll do--you'll
do!"

He sat there some minutes with his elbows on his knees and his face in
his hands. His friend remained looking at the portrait of Rachel, after
which she put to him: "Doesn't such a woman as that receive--receive
every one?"

"Every one who goes to see her, no doubt."

"And who goes?"

"Lots of men--clever men, eminent men."

"Ah what a charming life! Then doesn't she go out?"

"Not what we Philistines mean by that--not into society, never. She
never enters a lady's drawing-room."

"How strange, when one's as distinguished as that; except that she must
escape a lot of stupidities and _corvees_. Then where does she learn
such manners?"

"She teaches manners, _a ses heures_: she doesn't need to learn them."

"Oh she has given me ideas! But in London actresses go into society,"
Miriam continued.

"Oh into ours, such as it is. In London _nous melons les genres_."

"And shan't I go--I mean if I want?"

"You'll have every facility to bore yourself. Don't doubt it."

"And doesn't she feel excluded?" Miriam asked.

"Excluded from what? She has the fullest life."

"The fullest?"

"An intense artistic life. The cleverest men in Paris talk over her work
with her; the principal authors of plays discuss with her subjects and
characters and questions of treatment. She lives in the world of art."

"Ah the world of art--how I envy her! And you offer me Dashwood!"

Sherringham rose in his emotion. "I 'offer' you--?"

Miriam burst out laughing. "You look so droll! You offer me yourself,
then, instead of all these things."

"My dear child, I also am a very clever man," he said, trying to sink
his consciousness of having for a moment stood gaping.

"You are--you are; I delight in you. No ladies at all--no _femmes comme
il faut?"_ she began again.

"Ah what do _they_ matter? Your b