On the other
hand, when I'm staying with Hildegarde Shrubley I can never remember the
important circumstance whether her first husband got his unenviable
reputation on the Turf or the Stock Exchange, and that uncertainty rules
Sport and Finance out of the conversation at once. One can never mention
travel, either, because her second husband had to live permanently
abroad."
"Mrs. Shrubley and I move in very different circles," said Mrs. Eggelby
stiffly.
"No one who knows Hildegarde could possibly accuse her of moving in a
circle," said Clovis; "her view of life seems to be a non-stop run with
an inexhaustible supply of petrol. If she can get some one else to pay
for the petrol so much the better. I don't mind confessing to you that
she has taught me more than any other woman I can think of."
"What kind of knowledge?" demanded Mrs. Eggelby, with the air a jury
might collectively wear when finding a verdict without leaving the box.
"Well, among other things, she's introduced me to at least four different
ways of cooking lobster," said Clovis gratefully. "That, of course,
wouldn't appeal to you; people who abstain from the pleasures of the card-
table never really appreciate the finer possibilities of the
dining-table. I suppose their powers of enlightened enjoyment get
atrophied from disuse."
"An aunt of mine was very ill after eating a lobster," said Mrs. Eggelby.
"I daresay, if we knew more of her history, we should find out that she'd
often been ill before eating the lobster.
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