Page:Francis Crawford - Mr Isaacs.djvu/76

 "You malign me, Miss Westonhaugh. Snap is no less obedient than I."

"Then why did you insist on playing tennis left-handed the other day, though you know very well how it puzzles me?"

"My dear Miss Westonhaugh," he answered, "I am not a tennis-player at all, to begin with, and as I do not understand the finesse of the game, to use a word I do not understand either, you must pardon my clumsiness in employing the hand most convenient and ready."

"Some people," I began, "are what is called ambidexter, and can use either hand with equal ease. Now the ancient Persians, who invented the game of polo"

"I do not quarrel so much with you, Mr. Isaacs—" as she said this, she looked at me, though entirely disregarding and interrupting my instructive sentence—"I don't quarrel with you so much for using your left hand at tennis as for employing left-handed weapons when you speak of other things, or beings, for you are never so left-handed and so adroit as when you are indulging in some elaborate abuse of our sex."

"How can you say that?" protested Isaacs. "You know with what respectful and almost devotional reverence I look upon all women, and," his eyes brighttening [sic] perceptibly, "upon you in particular." English women especially in their youth, are not used to pretty speeches. They are so much accustomed to the men of their own nationality that they regard