“That’s in Shaw,” Mark guessed, “Clyde Fitch was talkin’ about it. But what’s wrong with actin’ like a gentleman?” “What’s the use? Your manners are quite all right. If you’d talk to people and collect ideas.... It’s so much more important to straighten out your ideas than to stand and hold a teacup properly. A butler can do that. I could train a navvy to do that. And--” “That’s an awful good looking dress,” he broke in, “Nicest you’ve had on since I’ve been here.” Olive let an arm trail on the mantel where the stone cooled it. “I’m talking about your intellect and you talk about my frock.” “I know something about dresses and I don’t know a thing about intellect. You ought to wear dark things because you’ve got such a nice sk--complexion.” “I don’t bother about clothes except when Jack’s at home and I want to keep his attention.... You were in Cuba, you said? Did you kill any one?” “Don’t know. Tried to. Why?” “I was wondering whether you’d mind killing an old duffer in Suffolk. He keeps my husband out of twelve hundred a year and a decentish house. Would you mind?” Mark saw this was meant as a joke and laughed, studying her arm which gleamed white on the white stone. “My husband’s uncle. He’s easily eighty and he’s very Tory.” “Haven’t got any uncles. Got an aunt that’s pretty awful. She’s a Methodist.” He wouldn’t look at her. He still stared at the arm sprawled on the mantel and smiled like a child. Olive wanted to hurt him suddenly, to rouse him. The glowing stare was too childish. She drawled, “I went into your bedroom to see that they’d swept it decently. Are those the family portraits on the desk? Who’s the fat girl with the baby?” “Sadie. My sister. She’s puttin’ on weight. Papa keeps two hired girls now and she don’t have to cook. The yellow-headed fellow’s her husband--Eddie Bernamer. Awful fine man.” He beamed at Olive now, doting on Eddie Bernamer’s perfections. Olive tried, “And the lad with the very huge pearl in his scarf is your brother? And they all live on your father’s farm? And you go down there and bore yourself to death over weekends?” “Don’t bore myself at all. I get all the New York I want weekdays. Fine to get out and ride a horse round. Nice house. We built a wing on when Joe got married last year.” The parlour-maid announced dinner. Mark gave Olive his arm and wanted to stroke her arm white across the black of his sleeve. He talked of his family through the meal and after it, leaning on the piano while Olive played. He tortured her with anecdotes of his and Joe’s infancy and with the deeds of Gurdy Bernamer. He sighed, reporting that Sadie’s oldest girl had died. “You mean you’re wearing mourning for a six year old child!” “Of course,” said Mark. “And then you ask me what a sentimentalist is!” Olive struck a discord into the Good Friday Spell and sneered, “I dare say you think life’s so full of unpleasantness that it shouldn’t be brought into the theatre!”