“Many women are not egoists. But you have been dining with one of the most finished egoists in London to-night.” “Lady Holme?” said Sir Donald, shifting into the left-hand corner of the sofa. “Yes, Viola Holme, once Lady Viola Grantoun; whom I mustn’t know any more.” “I’m not sure that you are right, Carey,” said Pierce, rather coldly. “What!” “Can a true and perfect egoist be in love?” “Certainly. Is not even an egoist an animal?” Pierce’s lips tightened for a second, and his right hand strained itself round his knee, on which it was lying. “And how much can she be in love?” “Very much.” “Do you mean with her body?” “Yes, I do; and with the spirit that lives in it. I don’t believe there’s any life but this. A church is more fantastic to me than the room in which Punch belabours Judy. But I say that there is spirit in lust, in hunger, in everything. When I want a drink my spirit wants it. Viola Holme’s spirit--a flame that will be blown out at death--takes part in her love for that great brute Holme. And yet she’s one of the most pronounced egoists in London.” “Do you care to tell us any reason you may have for saying so?” said Sir Donald. As he spoke, his voice, brought into sharp contrast with the changeful and animated voice of Carey, sounded almost preposterously thin and worn out. “She is always conscious of herself in every situation, in every relation of life. While she loves even she thinks to herself, ‘How beautifully I am loving!’ And she never forgets for a single moment that she is a fascinating woman. If she were being murdered she would be saying silently, while the knife went in, ‘What an attractive creature, what an unreplaceable personage they are putting an end to!’” “Rupert, you are really too absurd!” exclaimed Pierce, laughing reluctantly. “I’m not absurd. I see straight. Lady Holme is an egoist--a magnificent, an adorable egoist, fine enough in her brilliant selfishness to stand quite alone.” “And you mean to tell us that any woman can do that?” exclaimed Pierce. “Who am I that I should pronounce a verdict upon the great mystery? What do I know of women?” “Far too much, I’m afraid,” said Pierce. “Nothing, I have never been married, and only the married man knows anything of women. The Frenchmen are wrong. It is not the mistress who informs, it is the loving wife. For me the sex remains mysterious, like the heroine of my realm of dreams.” “You are talking great nonsense, Rupert.” “I always do when I am depressed, and I am very specially depressed to-night.” “But why? There must be some very special reason.” “There is. I, too, dined out and met at dinner a young man whose one desire in life appears to be to deprive living creatures of life.” Sir Donald moved slightly. “You’re not a sportsman, then, Mr. Carey?” he said.