"Quite so," replied Monty, concealing his feelings of superiority as well as he could. "By the way, talking of taste, what do you think of the new Danish poet? Rather strong, don't you think?" Katharine sighed, and glanced nervously at Ted. "Oh, I suppose he's all right," she said, with the exaggerated solemnity that would have betrayed to any one who knew her well how close she was to laughter; "but he isn't a bit new, is he? I mean, he only says the same things over again that the old poets said ever so much better. Don't you think so?" "They all give you the hump, any way," put in Ted. But Monty ignored his remark, and said that he never read any of the old poets; he preferred the new ones because they went so much deeper. "Hang it all, Kitty; what a rum girl you are!" said Ted, in a disappointed tone. "A chap never knows where to have you. I did think you were advanced, if you couldn't be anything else." At this point, Katharine yielded to an irresistible desire to laugh; and Ted looked anxiously at the friend to whom he had given such a false impression of her "ideas." But, to his surprise, the great Monty himself joined in her laughter, and seemed inexpressibly relieved to find that she was not nearly so intellectual as she had been painted, and it was therefore no longer incumbent on him to sustain the conversation at such a high pitch. "Now that we have settled I am not advanced," said Katharine, turning up her veil, "supposing we have some tea." And for the rest of the afternoon they behaved like rational beings, and discussed the low comedians and the comic papers. "All the same," Ted complained, when Monty had gone, "he's awfully clever, really. You may rot as much as you like, but Monty does know about things. You don't know what a fool he makes _me_ feel." "He needn't do that," said Katharine. "It would be the kindest thing in the world not to let him read another magazine or newspaper for six months. I think he is very nice, though, when he lets himself go." Ted looked at her a little sadly. "You seemed to be getting on beastly well, I thought," he said. "He is certainly very amusing, and it was nice of you to ask me to meet him," continued Katharine, innocently. Ted walked to the fire-place, and studied himself silently in the looking-glass. "I wish I wasn't such a damned fool," he burst out savagely. Katharine stood still with amazement. "Ted!" she cried. "Ted! What do you mean?" Ted planted his elbows on the mantel-shelf, and buried his face in his hands. "Ted!" she said again, with distress in her voice. "What do you mean, Ted? As if I--oh, Ted! And a man like _that_! You know piles more than he does, old boy, ever so much more. You don't put on any side, that's all; and he does. You mustn't say that any more, Ted; oh, you mustn't! It hurts."