to each other, a fact which people seem to find hard to believe.

My attention is being diverted from my writing by a lady sitting a few
yards away--the Candle we call her because so many silly young moths
hover round. She is a buxom person, with very golden hair growing
darker towards the roots, hard blue eyes, and a powdery white face. G.
and I are intensely interested to know what is the attraction about
her, for no one can deny there is one. She isn't young; the gods have
not made her fair, and I doubt of her honesty; yet from the first she
has been surrounded by men--most of them, I grant you, unfinished
youths bound to offices in Calcutta, but still men. I thought it might
be her brilliant conversation, but for the last half-hour I have
listened,--indeed we have no choice but to listen, the voices are so
strident,--and it can't be that, because it isn't brilliant or even
amusing, unless to call men names like Pyjamas, or Fatty, or Tubby,
and slap them playfully at intervals is amusing. A few minutes ago
Mrs. Crawley came to sit with us looking so fresh in a white linen
dress. I don't know why it is--she wears the simplest clothes, and yet
she manages to make all the other women look dowdy. She has the gift,
too, of knowing the right thing to wear on every occasion. At Port
Said, for instance, the costumes were varied. The Candle flopped on
shore in a trailing white lace dress and an enormous hat; some broiled
in serge coats and skirts; Mrs. Crawley in a soft green muslin and
rose-wreathed hat was a cool and dainty vision. Well, to return. As
Mrs. Crawley shook up her chintz cushions, she looked across at the
Candle--a long look that took in the elaborate golden hair, the much
too smart blouse, the abbreviated skirt showing the high-heeled
slippers, the crowd of callow youths--and then, smiling slightly
to herself, settled down in her chair. I grew hot all over for the
Candle. I don't suppose I need trouble myself. I expect she is used to