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Although she had been interested when Braybrooke had spoken of Craven's cleverness and energy, of his good prospects in his career, and of the appreciation of Eric Learington a man not given to undue praises she had been secretly irritated when he had come to the question of Beryl Van Tuyn and the importance of Craven's marrying well. Why should he marry at all? And if he must, why Beryl Van Tuyn?
Miss Van Tuyn was subtle enough to know that he was subtle too. She had made up her mind to explore his subtlety. And now someone else was exploring it in Berkeley Square. The line reappeared in her low white forehead, and her cult for Lady Sellingworth, like flannel steeped in water, underwent a shrinking process. She felt strongly the indecency of grasping old age.
Miss Van Tuyn said she might stay on for some time, and explained that she was having lessons in painting. "In London! I didn't know you painted, and surely the best school of painting is in Paris." "I don't paint, dearest. But one can take lessons in an art without actually practising the art. And that is what I am doing. I like to know even though I cannot, or don't want to, do.
Passion for her, perhaps, drove him on now that at last he had spoken, had held her in his arms. But suppose he had another reason for haste? He had seen Lady Sellingworth. He knew that she was a friend of the girl he wanted to marry. Miss Van Tuyn remembered that he had not welcomed her suggestion that the two couples, he and she, Lady Sellingworth and Craven, should have coffee together.
Craven Mr. Arabian." Arabian got up and bowed. "Pleased to meet you!" he said in a formal voice. "Good evening!" said Craven, staring hard at him. "I mustn't ask you to sit down," said Miss Van Tuyn. "As you are tied up with Adela. But" she hesitated for an instant, then continued with hardihood "can't you persuade Adela to join us for coffee?"
Everybody would understand and approve if he were to fall desperately in love with Beryl Van Tuyn; but if he were to prefer a great friendship with Lady Sellingworth to a love affair with her youthful and beautiful friend no one would understand, and everybody would be ready to laugh and condemn.
He did not wait for an answer, but drove on with immense energy, puffing away at his cigar and turning his small, keen eyes swiftly from Arabian to Miss Van Tuyn and back again.
Women certainly were difficult to understand. But it was all right now. His audacity for he thought it rather audacious of him to have asked Lady Sellingworth to dine alone with him at the Bella Napoli was going to be rewarded. As he changed his clothes he hummed to himself: "O Napoli! Bella Napoli!" At Claridge's meanwhile Miss Van Tuyn was not humming.
It's only a fausse jeunesse after all, but still very effective. The gap between the woman of the photograph and the woman of 18A Berkeley Square is as the gulf between Dives and Lazarus. I shouldn't have loved her then. But perhaps perhaps a man might have thought he did. I mean in the real way of a man perhaps." Craven did not inquire what Miss Van Tuyn meant exactly by that.
Lady Sellingworth got up slowly. "I promise that I will not show your letter. So don't be afraid." "I'm not afraid." Miss Van Tuyn held out her hand. "No doubt you have your reasons for doing what you have done. I don't pretend to understand them. And I don't understand you. But women are often incomprehensible to me. Perhaps that is why I usually prefer men. They don't plunge you in subtleties.
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