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She
threw down the penny novel she was reading, and with a little cry of joy
sprang forward to greet me.
"I'm so glad you've come. I was getting the blind hump!"
Did I not say she was commonplace? I hate this synonym for boredom.
It may be elegant in the mouth of a duchess and pathetic in that of an
oyster-wench, but it falls vulgarly from intermediate lips.
"What has given it to you?" I asked.
"My poor little ouistiti is dead. It is this abominable climate."
I murmured condolences. I could not exhibit unreasonable grief at the
demise of a sick monkey which I had never seen.
"I'm also out of books," she said, after having paid her tribute to the
memory of the departed. "I have been forced to ask the servants to lend
me something to read. Have you ever tried this sort of thing? You ought
to. It tells you what goes on in high society."
I was sure it didn't. Not a duchess in its pages talked about having a
blind hump. I said gravely:
"I will ask you to lend it to me. Since Dale has been away I've had no
one to make out my library list.


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