"Is it one lump? I forgot. You do
take milk, don't you? Would you like some more hot water, if it's too
strong?"
Cushat-Prinkly had read of such things in scores of novels, and hundreds
of actual experiences had told him that they were true to life. Thousands
of women, at this solemn afternoon hour, were sitting behind dainty
porcelain and silver fittings, with their voices tinkling pleasantly in a
cascade of solicitous little questions. Cushat-Prinkly detested the
whole system of afternoon tea. According to his theory of life a woman
should lie on a divan or couch, talking with incomparable charm or
looking unutterable thoughts, or merely silent as a thing to be looked
on, and from behind a silken curtain a small Nubian page should silently
bring in a tray with cups and dainties, to be accepted silently, as a
matter of course, without drawn-out chatter about cream and sugar and hot
water. If one's soul was really enslaved at one's mistress's feet how
could one talk coherently about weakened tea? Cushat-Prinkly had never
expounded his views on the subject to his mother; all her life she had
been accustomed to tinkle pleasantly at tea-time behind dainty porcelain
and silver, and if he had spoken to her about divans and Nubian pages she
would have urged him to take a week's holiday at the seaside.
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