“Could you help it? Could you, with all the best will in the world, make Potts a man of distinction? Would n't he, in spite of you, be low, vulgar, inquisitive, and obtrusive? Wouldn't you find him thrusting himself forward, twenty times a day, into positions he had no right to? Would n't the creature be a butt and a dupe--” “Shall I own,” burst I in, “that it gives me no exalted idea of your taste, if I find that you select for ridicule a person on the mere showing that his name is a monosyllable? And, once for all, I repudiate all share in the scheme, and beg that I may not hear more of it.” I turned away as I said this. She resumed her book, and we spoke no more to each other till we reached our halting-place for the night. CHAPTER XVII. MRS. KEATS MOVES MY INDIGNATION I am forced to the confession, Mrs. Keats was not what is popularly called an agreeable old lady. She spoke seldom, she smiled never, and she had a way of looking at you, a sort of cold astonishment, seeming to say, “How is this? explain yourself,” that kept me in a perpetual terror. My morning's tiff with Miss Herbert had neither been condoned nor expiated when we sat down to dinner, as stiff a party of three as can well be imagined; scarcely a word was interchanged as we ate. “If you drink wine, sir, pray order it,” said Mrs. Keats to me, in a voice that might have suited an invitation to prussic acid. “This little wine of the country is very pleasant, madam,” said I, courteously, “and I can even venture to recommend it.” “Not to me, sir. I drink water.” “Perhaps Miss Herbert will allow me?” “Excuse me; I also drink water.” After a very dreary and painful pause, I dared to express a faint hope that Mrs. Keats had not been fatigued by the day's Journey. She looked at me for a second or two before replying, and then said: “I am really not aware, sir, that I have manifested any such signs of weariness as would warrant your inquiry. If I should have, however--” “Oh, I beg you will pardon me, madam,” broke I in, apologetically; “my question was not meant for more than a mere ordinary politeness, a matter-of-course expression of my solicitude.” “It will save us both some trouble in future, sir, if I re-mark that I am no friend to matter-of-course civilities, and never reply to them.” I felt as though my head and face had been passed across the open door of a blast furnace. I was in a perfect flame, and dared not raise my eye from my plate. “The waiter is asking if you will take coffee, sir,” said the inexorable old lady to me, as I sat almost stunned and stupid. “Yes--with brandy--a full glass of brandy in it,” cried I, in the half-despair of one who knew not how to rally himself.