and it was as clear as possible that tights presented
themselves quite preposterously to any discussion of her profession.
They were things to be taken for granted, like the curtain and the
wings; they had no relation to clothing in the world.

Alicia laughed too. After all, they were absurd--her outsider's
prejudices. She said something like that, and Hilda seemed to soar again
for her point of view about the illustrated interviews. "They _are_
atrocities," she said. "On their merits they ought to be cast out of
even the suburbs of art and literature. But they help to make the
atmosphere that gives us power to work, and if they do that, of
course"----the pursed seriousness of her lips gave Alicia the impression
that, though the whole world took offence, the expediency of the
illustrated interview was beyond discussion.

The servant brought them coffee. "Shall we smoke here," said Miss
Livingstone, "or in the drawing-room?"

"Oh, do you want to? Are you quite sure you like it? Please don't on my
account--you really mustn't. Suppose it should make you ill?" If Hilda
felt any tinge of amusement she kept it out of her face. Nothing was
there but cheerful concern.

"It won't make me ill." Alicia lifted her chin with delicate
assertiveness. "I suppose you do smoke, don't you?"

"Occasionally--with some people. Honestly, have you ever done it
before?"

"Four times," said Alicia, and then turned rose-colour with the
apprehension that it sounded amateurish to have counted them. "I thought
it was one of your privileges to do it always, just as you--"

"Go to bed with our boots on and put ice down the back of some Serene
Highness's neck. I suppose it is, but now and then I prefer to dispense
with it. In my bath, for instance, and almost always in omnibuses."

"How absurd you are! Then we'll stay here."

Miss Howe softly manipulated her cigarette and watched Alicia sacrifice
two matches.

"There's Rosa Norton of our company," she went on. "Poor dear old Rosy.
She's fifty-three--grey hair smooth back, you know, and a kind of look
of anxious mamma. And it gets into her eyes and chokes her, poor dear;
but blow her if she won't be as Bohemian as anybody. I've seen her smoke
in a bonnet with strings tied under her chin. I got up and went away."

"But I can't possibly affect you in that way," said Alicia, putting her
cigarette down to finish, as an afterthought, a marron glacee. "I'm not
old and I'm not grotesque."

"No,