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"Conversational powers are sometimes very distressing," said Madame Valtesi. "Last winter I was having my house in Cromwell Road painted and papered. I went to live at a hotel, but the men were so slow, that at last I took possession again, hoping to turn them out. It was a most fatal step. They liked me so much, and found me so entertaining, that they have never gone away.
"She makes our rustic party complete." "We shall certainly be very rustic," said Lady Locke, with a smile, as she leaned back in her chair and took a cup of tea. "Yes, deliciously so. Madame Valtesi goes everywhere. She is one of the most entertaining people in London. Nobody knows who she is. I have heard that she is a Russian spy, and that her husband was a courier, or a chef, or perhaps both.
"Yes, Christians are getting very lively," said Madame Valtesi, helping herself to a cutlet in aspic. "They demand plenty of variety in their devotional exercises, and what Arthur Roberts, or somebody, calls 'short turns. The most popular of all the London clergymen invariably has an anthem that lasts half-an-hour, and preaches for five minutes by a stop watch."
As Lord Reggie went away, walking very delicately, with his head drooping towards his left shoulder, and his hands dangling in a dilettante manner at his sides, Madame Valtesi appeared at the French window of the drawing-room, refusing to join Tommy in some boyish game.
I must hear all the notes of the nightingales Do they sing to a God or to graven things And not till the last faint flute-note fails Will I stay my flight, will I fold my wings. When the last chord died away, Mrs. Windsor's voice was heard saying "I remember now, it made me cry. How dismal it is." "Yes," said Madame Valtesi, "as dismal as a wet Derby or a day at the seaside.
"Then I must be quite hopeless," said Lady Locke, "for I have spent eight years in the Straits Settlements." "Dear me!" murmured Madame Valtesi. "Where is that? It sounds like one of the places where that geographical little Henry Arthur Jones sends the heroes of his plays to expiate their virtues."
Windsor, Madame Valtesi, Lady Locke, and Lord Reggie, while Tommy in a loose white sailor suit scampered about from one place to another, simmering in perfect enjoyment.
"There is no such thing as luck in the world," Madame Valtesi remarked, putting up a huge white parasol that abruptly extinguished the view for miles. "There is only capability." "But some capable people are surely unlucky." "They are incapable in one direction or another. Have you not noticed that whenever a man is a failure his friends say he is an able man.
He is completely wonderful, and, wonderfully complete. He lives for sensations, while other people live for faiths, or for convictions, or for prejudices. He would make any woman unhappy. How beautiful!" "Is it always a sign of intelligence to be what others are not?" But she received no direct answer to her question, for at this moment Madame Valtesi and Mrs. Windsor came to them across the lawn.
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