_Lady Maisie_ (_puzzled_). She is very clever at mending lace, I know, though what _that_ has to do with it---- _Undershell._ Listen to me, Lady Maisie. I came to this house at your bidding. Yes, but for your written appeal, I should have treated the invitation I received from your aunt with silent contempt. Had I obeyed my first impulse and ignored it, I should have been spared humiliations and indignities which ought rather to excite your pity than--than any other sensation. Think--try to realise what my feelings must have been when I found myself expected by the butler here to sit down to supper with him and the upper servants in the housekeeper's room! _Lady Maisie_ (_shocked_). Oh, Mr. Blair! Indeed, I had no---- You weren't _really_! How _could_ they? What _did_ you say? _Undershell_ (_haughtily_). I believe I let him know my opinion of the snobbery of his employers in treating a guest of theirs so cavalierly. _Lady Maisie_ (_distressed_). But surely--_surely_ you couldn't suppose that my uncle and aunt were capable of---- _Undershell._ What else _could_ I suppose, under the circumstances? It is true I have since learnt that I was mistaken in this particular instance; but I am not ignorant of the ingrained contempt you aristocrats have for all who live by exercising their intellect--the bitter scorn of birth for brains! _Lady Maisie._ I am afraid the--the contempt is all on the other side; but if _that_ is how you feel about it, I don't wonder that you were indignant. _Undershell._ Indignant! I was _furious_. In fact, nothing would have induced me to sit down to supper at all, if it hadn't been for---- _Lady Maisie_ (_in a small voice_). Then--you _did_ sit down? With the servants! Oh, Mr. Blair! _Undershell._ I thought you were already aware of it. Yes, Lady Maisie, I endured even that. But (_with magnanimity_) you must not distress yourself about it now. If _I_ can forget it, surely you can do so! _Lady Maisie._ Can I? That _you_ should have consented, for any consideration whatever; how could you--how _could_ you? _Undershell_ (_to himself_). She admires me all the more for it. But I _knew_ she would take the right view! (_Aloud, with pathos._) I was only compelled by absolute starvation. I had had an unusually light lunch, and I was so hungry! _Lady Maisie_ (_after a pause_). That explains it, of course.... I hope they gave you a good supper! _Undershell._ Excellent, thank you. Indeed, I was astonished at the variety and even luxury of the table. There was a pyramid of quails---- _Lady Maisie._ I am pleased to hear it. But I thought there was something you were going to explain. _Undershell._ I have been _endeavouring_ to explain to the best of my ability that if I have undesignedly been the cause of--er--a temporary diversion in the state of Miss Phillipson's affections, no one could regret more deeply than I that the--er--ordinary amenities of the supper-table should have been mistaken for----