"Of course not. They do seem to want such--odd--things. The way I'm looked at sometimes--I declare it makes me feel perfectly ashamed!" said Miss Windus. Why she said it I don't know. It was the purest hypocrisy, and it was not likely to impose on Miss Causton, who had a nonchalant, still humour of her own.... But on second thoughts I don't know. I was not always sure, afterwards, when I got to know Miss Windus better, that she didn't really labour under some such delusion as this. "Do they?" Miss Causton asked lazily. "They don't worry me much. So long ago since I've seen one that I've nearly forgotten." There was a short pause, then: "Really, they stare so," Miss Windus continued, "look one so out of countenance--one really doesn't know which way to turn!" "No?" came Miss Causton's ironical dawdle. "Oh ... with a chance, my dear ... _I_ should!" ... I suppose she smiled as she said it. While appearing to lay herself perfectly open she had far more to hide than Miss Windus had. Miss Windus was shocked. "You _dreadful_ girl!... But really Louie, you must have noticed it. Why, you can see it the moment she comes into the room!" "Really?" came the other detached voice. "How quaint!... Who do you think she's after? Not the Baboon?..." I imagined the chuckle I didn't hear. I took it that the Baboon was myself. "Mandrill, my dear," Miss Windus corrected. "You really must take a memory powder!..." "Oh, I call it baboon," Miss Causton remarked with indifference. Then she laughed.... "How ridiculous you are! He's as big as a man ought to be anyway----" "Oh, quite!" "----and I declare you can look at him till he's quite good-looking!" "Oh!..." (I could almost see Miss Windus' quizzical eyes.) "Really, you are absurd!..." There was another short silence. "And by the way," Miss Windus next said, "_he's_ been rather--different somehow--lately, don't you think?" Sweets crunched for a moment, then: "Different?... Do you mean _he's_ been looking at you in that--ahem!--dreadful way?" "What, _that_ creature!..." "Beg yours, dear----" "_I_ should think so!... But I fancied he'd been somehow--not quite the same----" "Well, anything for a change, as the song says. Myself, if I found I couldn't get along without 'em, I should prefer----" But a "Sssh!" interrupted Miss Causton. Somebody had come into the farther bay, and the rest for a time was whispering. When next the conversation became audible its tenor did not seem to have changed. "Scented soap in a little celluloid box, too!" Miss Windus admired. "One must keep oneself clean," Miss Causton threw off. "Have some of this, dear. I simply had to have some chocolate nougat to-night!..." There was a rustling of tissue paper. "Well, it's a sign, and so's her hair-waving and polishing her nails and that lace yoke," Miss Windus resumed. "Oh yes, the pneumonia blouse----" "_And_ her heels--_and_ a scent-sachet!..."