" Having said this much, Lady Cressage
swept the crumbs aside and looked up. "So now," she added,
with a flushed smile, "since you love arguments so much,
how do you answer that?"
Celia smiled back. "Oh, I don't answer it at all," she said,
and her voice carried a kind of quizzical implication.
"Your proofs overwhelm me. I know nothing of him--and you
know so much!"
Lady Cressage regarded her companion with a novel
earnestness and directness of gaze. "I had a long,
long talk with him--the afternoon we came down from Glion."
Miss Madden rose, and going to the mantel lighted a cigarette.
She did not return to the table, but after a brief pause
came and took an easy-chair beside her friend, who turned
to face her. "My dear Edith," she said, with gravity,
"I think you want to tell me about that talk--and so I
beg you to do so. But if I'm mistaken--why then I beg
you to do nothing of the kind."
The other threw out her hands with a gesture of
wearied impatience, and then clasped them upon her knee.
"I seem not to know what I want! What is the good
of talking about it? What is the good of anything?"
"Now--now!" Celia's assumption of a monitor's tone
had reference, apparently, to something understood
between the two, for Lady Cressage deferred to it,
and even summoned the ghost of a smile.
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