Page:Hichens - The Green Carnation.djvu/215

Rh "Expression is my life," Lord Reggie said in a rather offended voice, drawing away his hand. A red spot appeared in each of his cheeks. He began to realise that he was refused because he was not admired. It seemed almost incredible.

"Then the expression that I see is you?" she asked.

"I suppose so," he replied, with a tinge of exceedingly boyish sulkiness.

"Then, till you have got rid of it never ask a woman to marry you. Men like you do not understand women. They do not try to; probably they could not if they did. Men like you are so twisted and distorted in mind that they cannot recognise their own distortion. It seems to me that Mr. Amarinth has created a cult. Let me call it the cult of the green carnation. I suppose it may be called modern. To me it seems very silly and rather wicked. If you would take that hideous green flower out of your coat, not because I asked you to, but because you hated it honestly, I might answer your question differently. If you could forget what you call art, if you could see life at all with a straight, untrammelled vision, if you could be like a man, instead of like nothing at all in heaven or earth except that dyed flower, I might perhaps care for you in the right way.