Olwen thought, "No; I can't imagine anybody liking her--in _that_ way!" Then she thought with a little start, "But if it were true--if all women were allowed even a tiny grain of that Charm, there would be no such thing as an 'Hotel Spinster.' No old maids in the world! How lovely!"
"Enter several characters from a French novel by Abel Hermant," pursued Mrs. Cartwright, as the door of the _salle_ nearest to their table swung open and admitted two ladies in deepest mourning, an old gentleman with a red speck in his button-hole, and a boy of four. "The son of those old people has just 'fallen on the field of honour'; the lovely young Madonna is his widow; that's his little boy. What a splendid child!"
The little French boy that followed his grown-ups so sedately down the room was as dark as a damson and clad in a white tunic that showed his dimpled arms and his strong brown legs. He left a wake of smiles. The Hotel Spinster put out a finger and touched him as he went by.
"There. I knew she'd do that," commented Mrs. Cartwright; that deep soft voice of hers running out in the sort of monologue that scarcely moved her lips. "That woman's fonder of children than anyone here, and a better hand with them, I bet. Did you see the little boy smile back at her? Only at _her_. Yet Fate has decreed that she's never to have a chick or child (though what point 'a chick' would have I never could fathom). Private means. Stodgy connections in Debrett. Left with a house of her own, probably, crammed with mahogany and Coalport--and no man's ever looked at her in her life."
"Dreadful!" murmured little Olwen; and her hand went up involuntarily to her breast.
(If that letter was true, what a gift she had it in her power to bestow upon that woman; upon any woman!)
"The latest in British officers, I see," ran on Mrs. Cartwright, pursuing the nonchalant soft stream of comment as she pursued her lunch. "Staying here on his pay. Giving as much for one _déjeuner_ here as would keep him for half a week at some little pension in the town, where he ought to be. _Very_ new; _very_ temporary commission. He had a talk with me in the lounge just now. A nice frank little Cockney. Told me he was a shop-assistant before he joined. '_And the next, Madame?_' Poor lad! The next is that he's learned what it is to be considered IT, and what the insides of the best hotels are like, and the chief seats at revues. He's learned Bubbly-tastes on Beer-pay. Overdrawn everywhere. What _will_ he go back to in civil life, if he goes back? Another tragedy of the war. Dozens of them!... Pleasant little pink face, too.... His only hope would be to get some profiteer's heiress to marry him----"