And Joshua launched forth into a description of his oratory, then related how he had won over juries in several important cases.  His arms, his hands were going, his eyes were glistening, his voice had that rich, sympathetic tone which characterizes the egotist when the subject is himself.  Miss Severence listened without comment; indeed, he was not sure that she was listening, so conventional was her expression.  But, though she was careful to keep her face a blank, her mind was busy.  Surely not since the gay women of Barras’s court laughed at the megalomaniac ravings of a noisy, badly dressed, dirty young lieutenant named Buonaparte, had there been a vanity so candid, so voluble, so obstreperous.  Nor did he talk of himself in a detached way, as if he were relating the performances and predicting the glory of a human being who happened to have the same name as himself.  No, he thrust upon her in every sentence that he, he himself and none other, had said and done all these splendid startling things, would do more, and more splendid.  She listened, astounded; she wondered why she did not burst out laughing in his very face, why, on the contrary, she seemed to accept to a surprising extent his own estimate of himself.

“He’s a fool,” thought she, “one of the most tedious fools I ever met.  But I was right; he’s evidently very much of a somebody.  However does he get time to do anything, when he’s so busy admiring himself?  How does he ever contrive to take his mind off himself long enough to think of anything else?”

Nearly an hour later Arkwright came for him, cut him off in the middle of an enthusiastic description of how he had enchained and enthralled a vast audience in the biggest hall in St. Paul.  “We must go, this instant,” said Arkwright.  “I had no idea it was so late.”

“I’ll see you soon again, no doubt, Mr. Craig,” said Miss Severence, polite but not cordial, as she extended her hand.

“Yes,” replied Craig, holding the hand, and rudely not looking at her but at Arkwright.  “You’ve interrupted us in a very interesting talk, Grant.”

Grant and Margaret exchanged smiles, Margaret disengaged her hand, and the two men went.  As they were strolling down the drive, Grant said:  “Well, what did you think of her?”

“A nobody—­a nothing,” was Craig’s wholly unexpected response.  “Homely—­at least insignificant.  Bad color.  Dull eyes.  Bad manners.  A poor specimen, even of this poor fashionable society of yours.  An empty-head.”

“Well—­well—­well!” exclaimed Arkwright in derision.  “Yet you and she seemed to be getting on beautifully together.”

“I did all the talking.”

“You always do.”

“But it was the way she listened.  I felt as if I were rehearsing in a vacant room.”

“Humph,” grunted Arkwright.

He changed the subject.  The situation was one that required thought, plan.  “She’s just the girl for Josh,” said he to himself.  “And he must take her.  Of course, he’s not the man for her.  She couldn’t care for him, not in a thousand years.  What woman with a sense of humor could?  But she’s got to marry somebody that can give her what she must have. ...  It’s very important whom a man marries, but it’s not at all important whom a woman marries.  The world wasn’t made for them, but for us!”