She told him about it, not omitting any of the points which had amused her.  Could Joost have heard her, he would have felt that his suspicion that she sometimes laughed at them more than justified; but she did not give a thought to Joost, and probably would not have paused if she had.  She wanted to pass the present time, and she was rather reckless how, so long as Rawson-Clew either talked himself, or seemed interested in what she said; also, it must be admitted, though it was to this man, it was something of a treat to talk freely again.  So she gave him the best account she could, not only of the excursion, but of other things too.  And if it was his attention she wanted, she should have been satisfied, for she apparently had it, at first only the interest of courtesy, afterwards something more; it even seemed, before the end, as if she puzzled him a little, in spite of his years and experience.

He found himself mentally contrasting the life at the Van Heigens’, as she described it, with that which he had imagined her to have led at Marbridge, and, now that he talked to her, he could not find her exact place in either.

“You must find Dutch conventionality rather trying,” he said at last.

“I am not used to it yet,” she answered; “when I am it will be no worse than the conventionality at home.”

He felt he was wrong in one of his surmises; clearly she was not really Bohemian.  “Surely,” he said, “you have not found these absurd rules and restrictions in England?”

“Not the same ones; we study appearances one way, and they do another; but it comes to the same thing, so far as I am concerned.  One day I hope to be able to give it up and retire; when I do I shall wear corduroy breeches and if I happen to be in the kitchen eating onions when people come to see me, I shall call them in and offer them a share.”

“Rather an uncomfortable ambition, isn’t that?” he inquired.  “I am afraid you will have to wait some time for its fulfilment, especially the corduroy.  I doubt if you will achieve that this side the grave, though you might perhaps make a provision in your will to be buried in it.”

Julia laughed a little.  “You think my family would object?  They would; but, you see, I should be retiring from them as well as from the world, the corduroy might be part of my bulwarks.”

“I don’t think you could afford it even for that; do you think women ever can afford that kind of disregard for appearances?”

“Plain ones can,” she said; “it is the only compensation they have for being plain; not much, certainly, seeing what they lose, but they have it.  When you can never look more than indifferent, it does not matter how much less you look.”

“That is a rather unusual idea,” he remarked; “it appears sound in theory, but in practice—­”

“Sounder still,” she answered him.

He laughed.  “I’m afraid you won’t make many converts here,” he said, “where nearly every woman is plain, and according to your experience, every one, men and women too, think a great deal of looks; at all events, correct ones.”