So I said, "Because it isn't in him. He's a bounder and a rotter."
Which was true.
"Not a bounder, Roly dear. His father's Sir Gilbert Hippisley.
Hippisleys of Leicestershire."
"A moral bounder, Lena. A slimy eel. Slips and wriggles out of things.
You'll never hold him. You're not his first affair, you know."
"I don't care," she said, "as long as I'm his last."
I could only stand and stare at that; her monstrous assumption of his
fidelity. Why, he couldn't even be faithful to one art. He wrote as
well as he painted, and he acted as well as he wrote, and he was never
really happy with a talent till he had debauched it.
"The others," she said, "don't bother me a bit. He's slipped and
wriggled out of their clutches, if you like.... Yet there was something
about all of them. Distinguished. That's it. He's so awfully fine and
fastidious about the women he takes up with. It flatters you, makes you
feel so sure of yourself. You know he wouldn't take up with _you_ if
you weren't fine and fastidious, too--one of his great ladies.... You
think I'm a snob, Roly?"
"I think you don't mind coming _after_ Lady Willersey.
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