Book-bot.com - read famous books online for free

The Pool in the Desert by Sara Jeannette Duncan
page 116 of 258 (44%)
I were together at the Club. It was the year, I remember, of the
great shindy as to whether foreign consuls should continue to be
made honourary members, in view of the sentiments some of them were
freely reflecting from Europe upon the subject of a war in South
Africa which was none of theirs. Certainly, feeling as they did, it
would have been better if they had swaggered less about a club that
stood for British Government; but I did not vote to withdraw the
invitation. We can not, after all, take notice of every idle word
that drops from Latin or Teutonic tongues; it isn't our way; but it
was a liverish cold weather on various accounts, and the public
temper was short. I heard from Dora oftener, Harris declared, than
he did. She was spending the winter with friends in Agra, and
Armour, of course, was there too, living at Laurie's Hotel, and
painting, Dora assured me, with immense energy. It was just the
place for Armour, a sumptuous dynasty wrecked in white marble and
buried in desert sands for three hundred years; and I was glad to
hear that he was making the most of it. It was quite by the way,
but I had lent him the money to go there--somebody had to lend it to
him--and when he asked me to decide whether he should take his
passage for Marseilles or use it for this other purpose I could
hardly hesitate, believing in him, as I did, to urge him to paint a
little more of India before he went. I frankly despaired of his
ever being able to pay his way in Simla without Kauffer, but that
was no reason why he should not make a few more notes for further
use at home, where I sometimes saw for him, when his desultory and
experimental days were over and some definiteness and order had come
into his work, a Bond Street exhibition.

I have not said all this time what I thought of Ingersoll Armour and
Dora Harris together, because their connection seemed too vague and
DigitalOcean Referral Badge