"Yes; most earnestly," answered Beulah gravely.
"Beulah Benton, I like you! You are honest indeed. At last I find
one who is." With a sudden impulse she laid her white, jeweled hand
on Beulah's.
"Is honesty, or, rather, candor, so very rare, Cornelia?"
"Come out from your 'loop-hole of retreat,' into the world, and you
can easily answer your own question."
"You seem to have looked on human nature through misanthropic
lenses."
"Yes; I bought a pair of spectacles, for which I paid a most
exorbitant price! but they were labeled 'experience'!" She smiled
frigidly.
"You do not seem to have enjoyed your tour particularly."
"Yes, I did; but one is glad to rest sometimes. I may yet prove a
second Bayard Taylor, notwithstanding. I should like you for a
companion. You would not sicken me with stereotyped nonsense."
Her delicate fingers folded themselves about Beulah's, who could not
bring herself to withdraw her hand.
"And, sure enough, you would not be adopted? Do you mean to adhere
to your determination, and maintain yourself by teaching?"
"I do."
"And I admire you for it! Beulah, you must get over your dislike to
me."
"I do not dislike you, Cornelia."
"Thank you for your negative preference," returned Cornelia, rather
amused at her companion's straightforward manner. Then, with a
sudden contraction of her brow, she added: "I am not so bearish as they give me credit for?"
"I never heard you called so."
"Ah! that is because you do not enter the enchanted circle of 'our
clique.' During morning calls I am flattered, cajoled, and fawned
upon. Their carriages are not out of hearing before my friends and
admirers, like hungry harpies, pounce upon my character, manners,
and appearance, with most laudable zest and activity. Wait till you
have been initiated into my coterie of fashionable friends! Why, the
battle of Marengo was a farce in comparison with the havoc they can
effect in the space of a morning among the characters of their
select visiting list! What a precious age of backbiting we city
belles live in!" She spoke with an air of intolerable scorn.
"As a prominent member of this circle, why do you not attempt to
rectify this spreading evil? You might effect lasting good."
"I am no Hercules, to turn the Peneus of reform through the Augean
realms of society," answered Cornelia, with an impatient gesture;
and, rising, she drew on her glove. Beulah looked up at her, and
pitied the joyless, cynical nature, which gave an almost repulsively
austere expression to the regular, faultless features.