Part 87 (2/2)
”You must be quite a loss to Scotland Yard,” Beth ventured. ”You would have been admirably fitted for that--er--delicate kind of work.”
”Well, I think I should,” he rejoined. ”You see I found _you_ out, and it was not so easy, for--er--no one seemed to know you. However, that does not matter. We'll soon introduce you.”
Beth smiled. ”Thank you,” she said drily, ”that will be very nice.”
”I'll bring Fitzkillingham presently; he'll do anything for me. He was one of our set at the 'Varsity. That's the best of going to the 'Varsity. You meet the right kind of people there, people who can help you, you know, if you can get in with them as I did. You'll like Fitzkillingham. He's a very good fellow.”
”Indeed!” said Beth. ”What has he done?”
”Done!” he echoed. ”Oh, nothing that I know of. Consider his position!
The Earl of Fitzkillingham, with a rent-roll of fifty thousand a year, has no need to do; he has only to be. There, he's caught my eye. I'll go and fetch him.”
”Pray do nothing of the kind,” said Beth emphatically. ”I have no wish to know him.”
The young man, disconcerted, turned and looked her full in the face.
”Why not?” he gasped.
”First of all, because you were going to present him without asking my permission,” Beth said, ”which is a liberty I should have had to resent in any case by refusing to know him; and secondly, because a man worth fifty thousand a year who has done no good in the world is not worth knowing. I don't think he should be allowed to _be_ unless he can be made to _do_. Pray excuse me if I shock your prejudices,”
she added, smiling. ”You do not know, perhaps, that in _our_ set, knowing people for position rather than for character is quite out of date?”
The young man smiled superciliously. ”That is rather a bourgeois sentiment, is it not?” he said.
”On the contrary,” said Beth, ”it is the other that is the huckster spirit. What is called knowing the right people is only the commercial principle of seeking some advantage. Certain people make a man's acquaintance, and pay him flattering attentions, not because their hearts are good and they wish to give him pleasure, but because there is some percentage of advantage to be gained by knowing him. That is to be bourgeois in the vulgar sense, if you like! And that is the trade-mark stamped upon most of us--selfishness! sn.o.bbishness! One sees it in the conventional society manners, which are superficially veneered, fundamentally bad; the outcome of self-interest, not of good feeling; one knows exactly how, where, and when they will break down.”
”What are you holding forth about, Beth?” said Mrs. Kilroy, coming up behind her.
”The best people,” Beth answered, smiling.
”You mean the people who call themselves the best people--Society, that is to say,” said Mrs. Kilroy cheerfully. ”Society is the sc.u.m that comes to the surface because of its lightness, and does not count, except in sets where ladies' papers circulate.”
”I am surprised to hear _you_ talk so, Mrs. Kilroy,” said Pointed Beard in an offended tone, as if society had been insulted in his person.
”I am sorry if I disappoint you,” said Mrs. Kilroy. ”And I confess I like my own set and their pretty manners; but I know their weaknesses.
There is no sn.o.b so sn.o.bbish as a sn.o.b of good birth. The upper cla.s.ses will be the last to learn that it is sterling qualities which are wanted to rule the world,--head and heart.”
”This gentleman will tell you that all that is bourgeois,” said Beth.
”I believe that at heart the bourgeois are sound,” said Angelica.
”Bourgeois signifies good, sound, self-respecting qualities to me, and steady principles.”
”But scarcely 'pretty manners,' I should suppose,” said Pointed Beard superciliously.
”Why not?” said Angelica. ”Sincerity and refinement make good manners, and principle is the parent of both.”
”Don't you think that for the most part Englishwomen are singularly lacking in charms of manner?” he asked precisely.
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