“What does he do?” pursued Mrs. Troyle magisterially.

“He edits the Cathedral Monthly ,” said her hostess, “and he’s enormously learned about memorial brasses and transepts and the influence of Byzantine worship on modern liturgy, and all those sort of things. Perhaps he is just a little bit heavy and immersed in one range of subjects, but it takes all sorts to make a good house-party, you know. You don’t find him too dull, do you?”

“Dullness I could overlook,” said the aunt of Clovis; “what I cannot forgive is his making love to my maid.”