For these reasons, and for others
which need not appear, I decline to state positively whether there
was anything irretrievably wrong in the relations between the
Man's Wife and the Tertium Quid. If there was, and hereon you
must form your own opinion, it was the Man's Wife's fault. She
was kittenish in her manners, wearing generally an air of soft and
fluffy innocence. But she was deadlily learned and evil-instructed;
and, now and again, when the mask dropped, men saw this,
shuddered and almost drew back. Men are occasionally particular,
and the least particular men are always the most exacting.
Simla is eccentric in its fashion of treating friendships. Certain
attachments which have set and crystallised through half-a-dozen
seasons acquire almost the sanctity of the marriage bond, and are
revered as such. Again, certain attachments equally old, and, to all
appearance, equally venerable, never seem to win any recognised
official status; while a chance-sprung acquaintance, not two
months born, steps into the place which by right belongs to the
senior. There is no law reducible to print which regulates these
affairs.
Some people have a gift which secures them infinite toleration,
and others have not. The Man's Wife had not. If she looked over
the garden wall, for instance, women taxed her with stealing their
husbands.
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