said it was concrete, that it dealt with the concrete. Mr. Kingcote looks contemptuous.”
“On the whole I think it’s rather more entertaining than Sir Thomas Browne,” remarked Ada. “At all events, it’s modern.”
“Another argument!” exclaimed Isabel. “You an ally, Ada! But don’t defend me at the expense of Mr. Kingcote’s respect.”
“Mr. Kingcote would probably respect me just as much, or as little, for the one taste as for the other.”
“Miss Warren would imply,” said Kingcote in a rather measured way, due to his habits of solitude, “that after all sincerity is the chief thing.”
“And a genuine delight in the Newgate Calendar,” added the girl, “vastly preferable to an affected reverence for Shakespeare.”
Kingcote looked at her sharply. One had clearly to take this young lady into account.
“You sketch from nature, I believe, Miss Warren?” he asked, to get the relief of a new subject.
“To please myself, yes.”
“And to please a good many other people as well,” said Mrs. Clarendon. “Ada’s drawings are remarkably good.”
“I should so much like to see your drawing of the cottage at Wood End,” said Kingcote.
“When was that made?” Isabel inquired, with a look of surprise.
Luncheon was announced. As they went to the dining-room, Kingcote explained that he had passed Miss Warren when she was engaged on the sketch, before ever he had thought of living in the cottage.
“Was it that which gave you the idea?” Isabel asked.
“Perhaps it kept the spot in my mind. I was on a walking tour at the time.”
“Not thinking of such a step?”
“No; the idea came subsequently.”
During the meal, conversation occupied itself with subjects such as the picturesque spots to be found about Winstoke, the interesting houses in that part of the county, Mr. Vissian and his bibliomania, the precocity of Percy Vissian. Ada contented herself with a two-edged utterance now and then, not given however in a disagreeable way; on the whole she seemed to like their guest’s talk. Kingcote several times found her open gaze turned upon himself, and was reminded of the evening when she parted from Mr. Vissian at the gates of Knightswell.
The drawing-room had French windows, opening upon the lawn. When they had repaired thither after lunch, Ada, after sitting in silence for a few moments, rose and went out into the open air. Mrs. Clarendon followed her with her eyes, and seemed about to speak, but in the end let her pass unaddressed.
Kingcote was examining the caryatides on either side of the fireplace. He turned, saw that his hostess was alone, and came to a seat near her.
“Are you not very lonely in your cottage?” Isabel asked.
“Sometimes, yes. But then I went there for the sake of loneliness.”
“It isn’t rude to ask you? You are doing literary work, no doubt?”
“No; I am doing no work at all.”
“But however do you spend your time in that dreadful place?”
“Dreadful? Does it show to you in that light?”
“Picturesque, I admit; but——”
She paused, with her head just on one side. “I can well understand the horror with which you regard such a mode of life,” said Kingcote, laughing. “But I have never had the habit of luxury, and, so long as I am free, nothing else matters much.”
“Free from what?”
“From sights and sounds which disgust me, from the contiguity of mean and hateful people, from suggestions which make life hideous; free to live with my fancies, and in the thoughts of men I love.”
Isabel regarded him with a half-puzzled smile, and reflected before she spoke again.
“What and where are all these things which revolt you?” she asked.
“Wherever men are gathered together; wherever there is what is called Society, and, along with it, what is called a social question.”
“But you are not a misanthropist?” Kingcote was half amused to perceive the difficulty she had in understanding him. Suggestions of this kind were evidently quite new to her; probably she did not even know what he meant by the phrase “social question.”
“I am not, I believe, a misanthropist, as you understand the word. But I had rather live alone than mix with men in general.”
“To me it would be dreadful,” said Isabel, after a moment’s thought. “I cannot bear solitude.”
“The society of refined and cultured people is the habit of your life.”
“Refined—in a sense. Cultured?—I am not so sure of that. You would not call them cultured, the people I live amongst. I am not a clever woman, Mr. Kingcote. My set is not literary nor artistic, nor anything of that kind. I am disposed to think we should come into the category of ‘mean and hateful people’—though of course you wouldn’t like to tell me so.”
“I was thinking of quite other phases of life. My own experience has not been, on the whole, among people who belong to what is called society. I have lived—in a haphazard way—with the classes that have no social standing, so, you see, I have no right to comment upon your circles.”
Isabel glanced at him, and turned her eyes away. A fan was lying on the table close by her; she reached it, and played with the folds.
“But at all events,” she resumed, as if to slightly change the tone, “you have had the Vissians. Don’t you find them delightful? I do so like Mr. Vissian, with his queer bookhunting, and Mrs. Vissian is charm itself. These are congenial associates, no doubt?”
“Very; I like them extremely. Has Mr. Vissian told you how my acquaintance with him began?”
“Nothing, except that you met somehow in connection with the cottage.”
“The good rector is wonderfully discreet,” said Kingcote, with a smile. And he related the story of the Midsummer Day on which he walked from Salcot to Winstoke.
“It really was an act of unexampled generosity on Mr. Vissians part, to trust a stranger, with so dubious a story. But the first edition of ‘Venice Preserved’ no doubt seemed to him a guarantee of respectability. I had the book bound during the few days that I spent in London, and made him a present of it when I returned.”
“You have friends in London?” Isabel asked. “Relations?”
“A sister—married. My parents are not living.”
“But of friends, companions?”
“One, an artist. Did you visit the Academy this year?
