But I
am not up in Solomon!" she admitted hastily, retreating from the
subject in new dismay.
The time had arrived for Pansy to depart; but she reclined in her
morocco alcove with somewhat the stiffness of a tilted bottle and
somewhat the contour. She felt extreme dissatisfaction with her
visit and reluctance to terminate it.
Her idea of the difference between people in society and other
people was that it hinged ornamentally upon inexhaustible and
scanty knowledge. If Mrs. Meredith was a social leader, and she
herself had no social standing at all, it was mainly because that
lady was publicly recognized as a learned woman, and the world had
not yet found out that she herself was anything but ignorant.
Being ignorant was to her mind the quintessence of being common;
and as she had undertaken this morning to prove to Dent's mother
that she was not common, she had only to prove that she was
learned. For days she had prepared for this interview with that
conception of its meaning. She had converted her mind into a kind
of rapid-firing gun; she had condensed her knowledge into
conversational cartridges. No sooner had she taken up a mental
position before Mrs. Meredith than the parlors resounded with
light, rapid detonations of information. That lady had but to
release the poorest, most lifeless, little clay pigeon of a remark
and Pansy shattered it in mid air and refixed suspicious eyes on
the trap.
But the pigeons soon began to fly less frequently.
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