He turned impatiently to the young women.... They seemed at first much more congenial spirits. And yet there was something odd about them, too—something odd in their very friendliness. His hostess, Doris Pelman, a strikingly handsome girl, tall and fair, was the one with whom he had what most nearly resembled a conversation—a thing difficult enough to achieve at a tea. What immediately impressed him was that she did not seem at all conscious of her looks—she might, from her behaviour, not have been possessed of any; or rather, the mysterious barrier across which two strangers, man and woman, must communicate, seemed not to be there for her; she was apparently unaware of herself and him, in a way that even old Mrs. Perk, a grandmother, never could be. There was in her manner an utter absence of shyness, an apparent perfect ease in this contact of personalities. But in her easy unembarrassed friendliness there was something steely and aloof—a fundamental untouchableness. She talked fluently, about his work and hers—she was an interior decorator, it appeared,—about the new books and plays, and, with an especial zest, about people.... A peculiar zest, too: she had a way, which at first gave him an uncanny feeling, of talking about human beings as though they were insects. The only things of which she spoke with visible affection were the fabrics and materials of her profession—and art in general. But they were all, he felt, rather like this. The tea had become a kind of family gathering, in which only Felix felt out of place. Dusk fell, tall candles were lighted, and everyone became anecdotal. It would seem that they had spent their lives in collecting these anecdotes, and they related them and heard them with an inexhaustible relish—each one being rehearsed at full length with a loving care for the minutest psychological details. Some of these stories were apparently precious gems in their collection, worthy of being taken out and enjoyed over and over again. Other stories they laughed over uproariously, chokingly, helplessly—though to Felix the point of these seemed frequently rather obscure, and seldom very funny. He went away feeling surprised, and not knowing quite whether he was disappointed or grateful at the absence of any challenge in these new feminine acquaintanceships. He had never consciously realized, except now in its absence, that undercurrent of vague questioning, at once delightful and disconcerting, as to just what there might be in a new “friendship”—what rich and beautiful possibilities it might hold in store: all the familiar and foolish day-dreaming that follows the most casual meeting of masculine with feminine youth. But here there was no question whatever; imagination took no hold on this extraordinarily self-possessed, this imperturbable young womanhood.... Here was, indeed, the “detached attitude”! ------------------------------------------------------------------------