“I dare say you read quantities of bad novels,” she observed. “Well, I like Monsieur Beaucaire and Kim better’n anything I’ve read lately,” said her bewildering pupil, “Say, who was Pico della Mirandola?” “I don’t think I can talk about the Renascence in Winchester choir,” Olive choked and took him away. Save for the studied clarity of voice he showed no theatrical traits. He resented the sign of The Plume of Feathers beside the West Gate because “it spoiled the wall.” He asked if the Butter Cross was a well and bought several postcards at a shop where the squared panes arrested him. Olive made conjectures. She was twenty-six. She had known actors in some bulk. This wasn’t an actor, observably. She guided him back toward the college and through a swarm of lads in flannels. At these Mark looked and sighed. “Why that sob?” “Dunno. I s’pose because kids are havin’ such an awful good time and don’t know it. I mean--they’ll get married and all that.” “Are you married?” Mark said cheerfully, “Divorced.” “Tell me about it.” “D--don’t think I’d better, Mrs. Ilden.” “Is that American?” “Is--is what?” “That delicate respect for my sensibilities.” “Don’t know what you mean exactly. I had to divorce Cor--my wife and I’d rather not talk about it.” Olive felt alarmed. She said, “I’m supposed to tutor you in art and ethics and I’m merely trying to get your point of view, you know? Don’t look so shocked.” “I don’t see what my gettin’ divorced has to do with art and ethics.... Oh, was this man Leighton a better painter’n Whistler?” His questions ranged from the salary of canons to professional cricket. He wore a small and single pearl in his shirt at dinner, sat eating chastely and stared at Olive between the candles that made his grey eyes black in the brown of his face. The parlour-maid brought him the silver bowl of chutney three unnecessary times. He timidly corrected Olive’s views on farm labour in the United States with, “I’m afraid you’re wrong. I was brought up on a farm.” “Really? I was wondering.” “Fayettesville. It’s up in the woods behind Trenton. Say, what’s the Primrose League?” For a week Olive tried to outline this mentality. He plunged from subject to subject. Economics wearied him. “What’s it matter what kind of a gover’ment you have so long as folks get enough to eat and the kids ain’t--don’t have to work?” Religion, he said, was all poppycock. His “papa” admired Robert Ingersoll and “What’s it matter whether folks have souls or not?” “You’re a materialist,” she laughed. “Well, what of it?” “I’m trying to find out what your ethical standards are. Why don’t you cheat at poker?” “Because it ain’t fair. It’s like stealin’ a man’s wife.” “Some one stole your wife, didn’t he?” Mark finally chuckled. “You’d hardly call it stealing. She just walked off when she knew I’d--heard about it.”