She was doing a perfectly innocent little thing, one that at any other time I might have found charming. Her long fingers were slyly lifting the tops of sandwich after sandwich in search of the kind she wanted. A child does the same thing with sweets--and sometimes goes beyond mere peeping. But the infantility of the gesture jarred on me, and jarred no less when, her eyes meeting mine, she laughed, pouted, and said: "Well, after all, I cut them." I did not smile. Her coolness and unconcern when a friend was savagely attacked disappointed me. As for the portrait that was to have been the excuse for my call on her, I was glad now that it hadn't been mentioned. I now doubted whether I should mention it. I had supposed her to be a woman--not merely a female painter who gave a male sitter tea in her studio. "I don't understand you," I said, a little curtly I'm afraid. "You speak as if that book was a mere point of view to which she's entitled." Again she smiled at me, as if she liked me very much. "Well, she has her point of view. It's evident that you don't know Mrs Bassett." "Her book's told me all about her that I ever want to know." "So," she laughed, "you're just showing how cross you can be?" At that moment there came a ring at the bell. She was on her feet instantly, as if to forestall the little maid. With less tact than ever, I thought, her fingertips touched my shoulder lightly as she passed by me. It was only then that I noticed that the Benares tray held a third cup and saucer. The next moment she had shown Mrs Bassett herself in. I am going to show Mrs Bassett in and out of this story again with all possible speed. Only once have I set eyes on the lady since, and that was in a moment when I was far too occupied with other matters to give her more than a glance. She came in, a fluff of cendré hair, surmounted by a hat made of a thousand brilliant tiny blue feathers. This was intended to enhance the pallid blue of her eyes; as a matter of fact it completely extinguished it. She was a Christmas-tree of silver stole and silver muff, toy dog, and a pale blue padded and embroidered object that I presently discovered to be the dog's quilt. I was presented to her, bowed, and--suddenly found myself alone with her. Miss Oliphant had picked up the teapot and was nowhere to be seen. And this was the kind of arch ripple that proceeded from the author of _The Parthian Arrow_: