Melicent Talks

“David Hosmer, you are the most supremely unsatisfactory man existing.”

Hosmer had come in from his ride, and seating himself in the large wicker chair that stood in the center of the room, became at once absorbed in reflections. Being addressed, he looked up at his sister, who sat sidewards on the edge of a table slightly removed, swaying a dainty slippered foot to and fro in evident impatience.

“What crime have I committed now, Melicent, against your code?” he asked, not fully aroused from his reverie.

“You’ve committed nothing; your sin is one of omission. I absolutely believe you go through the world with your eyes, to all practical purposes, closed. Don’t you notice anything; any change?”

“To be sure I do,” said Hosmer, relying on a knowledge lent him by previous similar experiences, and taking in the clinging artistic drapery that enfolded her tall spare figure, “you’ve a new gown on. I didn’t think to mention it, but I noticed it all the same.”

This admission of a discernment that he had failed to make evident, aroused Melicent’s uncontrolled mirth.

“A new gown!” and she laughed heartily. “A threadbare remnant! A thing that holds by shreds and tatters.”

She went behind her brother’s chair, taking his face between her hands, and turning it upward, kissed him on the forehead. With his head in such position, he could not fail to observe the brilliant folds of muslin that were arranged across the ceiling to simulate the canopy of a tent. Still holding his face, she moved it sidewards, so that his eyes, knowing now what office was expected of them, followed the line of decorations about the room.

“It’s immense, Mel; perfectly immense. When did you do it all?”

“This afternoon, with Grégoire’s help,” she answered, looking proudly at her work. “And my poor hands are in such condition! But really, Dave,” she continued, seating herself on the side of his chair, with an arm about his neck, and he leaning his head back on the improvised cushion, “I wonder that you ever got on in business, observing things as little as you do.”

“Oh, that’s different.”

“Well, I don’t believe you see half that you ought to,” adding naively, “How did you and Mrs. Lafirme happen to come home together this evening?”