 of some
unique objects of art. The sly approaches, the astute negotiations, the lying
and the circumventing ... for the love of beauty, you know.«
    With his dark face and with the perpetual smiles playing about his grimness,
Mr. Blunt appeared to me positively satanic. Mills' hand was toying absently
with an empty glass. Again they had forgotten my existence altogether.
    »I don't know how an object of art would feel,« went on Blunt, in an
unexpectedly grating voice, which, however, recovered its tone immediately. »I
don't know. But I do know that Rita herself was not a Danaë, never, not at any
time of her life. She didn't mind the holes in her stockings. She wouldn't mind
holes in her stockings now. ... That is if she manages to keep any stockings at
all,« he added, with a sort of suppressed fury so funnily unexpected that I
would have burst into a laugh if I hadn't been lost in astonishment of the
simplest kind.
    »No - really!« There was a flash of interest from the quiet Mills.
    »Yes, really,« Blunt nodded and knitted his brows very devilishly indeed.
»She may yet be left without a single pair of stockings.«
    »The world's a thief,« declared Mills, with the utmost composure. »It
wouldn't mind robbing a lonely traveller.«
    »He is so subtle.« Blunt remembered my existence for the purpose of that
remark and as usual it made me very uncomfortable. »Perfectly true. A lonely
traveller. They are all in the scramble from the lowest to the highest. Heavens!
What a gang! There was even an Archbishop in it.«
    »Vous plaisantez,« said Mills, but without any marked show of incredulity.
    »I joke very seldom,« Blunt protested earnestly. »That's why I haven't
mentioned His Majesty - whom God preserve. That would have been an exaggeration.
... However, the end is not yet. We were talking about the beginning. I have
heard that some dealers in fine objects, quite mercenary people of course (my
mother has an experience in that world), show sometimes an astonishing
reluctance to part with some specimens, even at a good price. It must be very
funny. It's just possible that the uncle and the aunt have been rolling in tears
on the floor, amongst their oranges, or beating their heads against the walls
from rage and
