"So she is; you were right there; although the construction of your sentence is faulty, Mr. Gibb. She's a divinity among women; a poem among girls; the ideal which a man sets up for himself of what a woman may be when God chooses." "Is she, sir?" "Look at her! how she walks, how she moves, how she bears herself! And what a voice! had Orpheus had it he'd have needed no warbling string to aid him to draw 'iron tears down Pluto's cheek!' Then what beauty's in her face; but there's in it what not one beautiful woman in a thousand has, there's a soul! Mr. Gibb, I've only seen Miss Lindsay about twenty minutes, but I regard her as 'a perfect woman, nobly planned'; and I may add 'she was a phantom of delight, when first she gleamed upon my sight,' therefore I say you were guilty of conspiracy in luring me on to ask her to come here; because what has the result been?" "What has it, sir?" "The result has been that I've made an idiot of myself; a complete and perfect ass." "Have you, sir?" "I don't like your tone, Mr. Gibb, it exacerbates. It is in itself enough to prove your guilt. Had you not been engaged in a conspiracy you would have been surprised beyond measure at the wholly unforeseen result. But, as it is, I put it to you, Mr. Gibb; are you surprised?" "Well, sir, in a way I can't say I am, not exactly." "There you are! there you are! Do you know, Mr. Gibb, that I've given Miss Lindsay to understand that I've retained her services as a member of my staff?" "She told me you'd engaged her, sir." "Oh, she did, did she? What did she tell you I'd engaged her as?" "As jobbing secretary, sir." "And pray what is a jobbing secretary?" "That's what I was wondering." "She asked me what a jobbing secretary was; and I explained as clearly as I could under the circumstances, and considering that I don't know myself. When you reflect on the fact that I have engaged her to be something which I never heard of before you will have grasped the initial difficulty of my position; which is complicated by the further fact that she is, what she certainly is, a divinity among women. If she'd come, say, about twelve and leave before one; or if she'd spend a few hours daily in intellectual conversation with me in here; or if she'd come out with me to enjoy the air, say on the top of an omnibus; or even if she'd go out with you, for a little pedestrian exercise, from two to six; the situation might be lightened. But she'll do none of these things; she's as good as said so. She told me, with a delicious seriousness which took all idea of resistance clean out of me, that she meant to do a man's work for a man's wage. Now, Mr. Gibb, in this office I don't see how it's going to be done." "I'm sure I don't." "I don't do a man's work." "No, sir, you don't." "You do still less." On this point Mr. Gibb was discreetly silent; he seemed to be turning something over in his mind, of which he presently gave Mr. Hooper the benefit.