Publisher's Synopsis
"Only to shut up wicked conservatives. I always feel as if I were talking to youover something with a neat top-finish of broken glass.""Do you know him well, this unreformed reformer?" Osmond went on, questioning Isabel."Well enough for all the use I have for him.""And how much of a use is that?""Well, I like to like him.""'Liking to like'-why, it makes a passion!" said Osmond."No"-she considered-"keep that for liking to dislike.""Do you wish to provoke me then," Osmond laughed, "to a passion for him?"She said nothing for a moment, but then met the light question with a disproportionate gravity. "No, Mr. Osmond; I don't think I should ever dare to provoke you. Lord Warburton, at any rate," she more easily added, "is a very nice man.""Of great ability?" her friend enquired."Of excellent ability, and as good as he looks.""As good as he's good-looking do you mean? He's very good-looking. How detestably fortunate!-to be a great English magnate, to be clever and handsome into the bargain, and, by way of finishing off, to enjoy your high favour! That's a man I could envy."Isabel considered him with interest. "You seem to me to be always envying some one. Yesterday it was the Pope; to-day it's poor Lord Warburton.""My envy's not dangerous; it wouldn't hurt a mouse. I don't want to destroy the people-I only want to be them. You see it would destroy only myself.""You'd like to be the Pope?" said Isabel."I should love it-but I should have gone in for it earlier. But why"-Osmond reverted-"do you speak of your friend as poor?""Women-when they are very, very good sometimes pity men after they've hurt them; that's their great way of showing kindness," said Ralph, joining in the conversation for the first time and with a cynicism so transparently ingenious as to be virtually innocent."Pray, have I hurt Lord Warburton?" Isabel asked, raising her eyebrows as if the idea were perfectly fresh."It serves him right if you have," said Henrietta while the curtain rose for the ballet.
