Standing with his head
slightly on one side and one hand resting on the table while the other
saw that nothing was disarranged between collar and top waistcoat
button, he was an interjection-point of imitation and attention.
"The editor of the _Chronicle_?" Hilda asked with diffident dignity, and
very well informed to the contrary.
"_Not_ the editor--I am sorry to say." The confession was delightfully
vivid--in the plentitude of his candour it was plain that he didn't care
who knew that he was sorry he was not the editor. "In journalistic
parlance the sub-editor," he added. "Will you be seated, Miss Howe?" and
with a tasteful silk pocket handkerchief he whisked the bottom of a
chair for her.
"Then you are Mr. Molyneux Sinclair," Hilda declared. "You have been
pointed out to me on several first nights. Oh, I know very well where
the _Chronicle_ seats are!"
Mr. Sinclair bowed with infinite gratification and tucked the silk
handkerchief back so that only a fold was visible. "We members of the
Fourth Estate are fairly well known, I'm afraid, in Calcutta," he said.
"Personally, I could sometimes wish it were otherwise. But certainly not
in this instance."
Hilda gave him a gay little smile.
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