‘I am in no hurry,’ said Johnny.  Then he sat down again, stretched out his legs and made himself comfortable.

‘I have been to see that woman,’ said Madalina after a pause.

‘What woman?’

’Maria Clutterbuck—­as I must always call her; for I cannot bring myself to pronounce the name of that poor wretch who was done to death.’

‘He blew his brains out in delirium tremens,’ said Johnny.

‘And what made him drink?’ said Madalina with emphasis.  ’Never mind.  I decline altogether to speak of it.  Such a scene as I have had!  I was driven at last to tell her what I thought of her.  Anything so callous, so heartless, so selfish, so stone-cold, and so childish, I never saw before!  That Maria was childish and selfish I always knew;—­but I thought there was some heart—­a vestige of heart.  I found today that there was none—­none.  If you please we won’t speak of her any more.’

‘Certainly not,’ said Johnny.

‘You need not wonder that I am tired and feverish.’

’That sort of thing is fatiguing, I daresay.  I don’t know whether we do not lose more than we gain by those strong emotions.’

’I would rather die and go beneath the sod at once, than live without them,’ said Madalina.

‘It’s a matter of taste,’ said Johnny.

’It is there that the poor wretch is so deficient.  She is thinking now, this moment, of nothing but her creature comforts.  That tragedy has not even stirred her pulses.’

‘If her pulses were stirred ever so, that would not make her happy.’

‘Happy!  Who is happy?  Are you happy?’

Johnny thought of Lily Dale and paused before he answered.  No; certainly he was not happy.  But he was not going to talk about his unhappiness with Miss Demolines!  ’Of course I am;—­as jolly as a sandboy,’ he said.

‘Mr Eames,’ said Madalina raising herself on her sofa, ’if you can not express yourself in language more suitable to the occasion and to the scene than that, I think that you had better—­’

‘Hold my tongue.’

’Just so;—­though I should not have chosen myself to use words so abruptly discourteous.’

’What did I say:—­jolly as a sandboy?  There is nothing wrong in that.  What I meant was that I think that the world is a very good sort of world, and that a man can get along in it very well if he minds his p’s and q’s.’

‘But suppose it’s a woman?’

‘Easier still.’

‘And suppose she does not mind her p’s and q’s?’

‘Women always do.’

’Do they?  Your knowledge of women goes as far as that, does it?  Tell me fairly;—­do you think you know anything about women?’ Madalina as she asked the question, looked full into his face, and shook her locks and smiled.  When she shook her locks and smiled, there was a certain attraction about her of which John Eames was fully sensible.  She could throw a special brightness into her eyes, which, though it probably betokened nothing beyond ill-natured mischief, seemed to convey a promise of wit and intellect.