"
It was not in Vavasor's usual taste: he had forgotten his best manners.
But in truth he never had any best manners: comparatively few have
anything but second-best, as the court of the universe will one day
reveal. Hester did not like the remark, and he fancied from her look she
had misunderstood him.
"Many a singer and actress too has married a duke or a marquis," he
supplemented in explanation.
"What sort of a duke or marquis?" asked Hester, in a studiedly wooden
way. "It was the more shame to them," she added.
"Pardon me. I cannot allow that it would be any shame to the best of our
nobility--"
"I beg your pardon--I meant to the professionals," interrupted Hester.
Vavasor was posed. To her other eccentricities it seemed Miss Raymount
added radicalism--and that not of the palest pink! But happily for him,
Cornelius, who had been all the time making noises on the piano, at this
point appeared at the window.
"Come, Hetty," he said, "sing that again. I shall sing it ever so much
better after! Come, I will play the accompaniment."
"It's not worth singing. It would choke me--poor, vapid, vulgar thing!"
"Hullo, sis!" cried Cornelius; "it's hardly civil to use such words
about any song a fellow cares to sing!"
Hester's sole answer was a smile, in which, and I am afraid it was
really there, Vavasor read contempt, and liked her none the worse for
it.
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