As he spoke he lifted a chair and placed it beside her, under one of the
cedars which made deep shade upon the grass.
"She plays at Lady Bountiful," said Mrs. Alcot. "She doesn't do it well,
but--"
"--The wonder is, in Johnsonian phrase, that she should do it at all.
Anything else?"
"I understand--she is writing a book--a novel."
Darrell threw back his head and laughed long and silently.
"Il ne manquait que cela," he said--"that Lady Kitty should take to
literature!"
Mrs. Alcot looked at him rather sharply.
"Why not? We frivolous people are a good deal cleverer than you think."
The languid arrogance of the lady's manner was not at all unbecoming.
Darrell made an inclination.
"No need to remind me, madam!" A recent exhibition at an artistic club
of Mrs. Alcot's sketches had made a considerable mark. "Very soon you
will leave us poor professionals no room to live."
The slight disrespect of his smile annoyed his companion, but the day
was hot and she had no repartee ready. She only murmured as she threw
away her cigarette:
"Kitty is much disappointed in the village."
"They are greater brutes than she thought?"
"Quite the contrary.
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