'
'As I never know whether you are in earnest, I don't now,' she
said, looking up inquiringly at the hairy face of the oracle. And
coming gallantly to her own rescue, 'If I really seem vain, it is
that I am only vain in my ways--not in my heart. The worst women
are those vain in their hearts, and not in their ways.'
'An adroit distinction. Well, they are certainly the more
objectionable of the two,' said Knight.
'Is vanity a mortal or a venial sin? You know what life is: tell
me.'
'I am very far from knowing what life is. A just conception of
life is too large a thing to grasp during the short interval of
passing through it.'
'Will the fact of a woman being fond of jewellery be likely to
make her life, in its higher sense, a failure?'
'Nobody's life is altogether a failure.'
'Well, you know what I mean, even though my words are badly
selected and commonplace,' she said impatiently. 'Because I utter
commonplace words, you must not suppose I think only commonplace
thoughts. My poor stock of words are like a limited number of
rough moulds I have to cast all my materials in, good and bad; and
the novelty or delicacy of the substance is often lost in the
coarse triteness of the form.'
'Very well; I'll believe that ingenious representation. As to the
subject in hand--lives which are failures--you need not trouble
yourself. Anybody's life may be just as romantic and strange and
interesting if he or she fails as if he or she succeed.
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