Page:Under the Deodars - Kipling (1890).djvu/13

 Mussuck swelled with pride. He is coming to call on me to-morrow. The Hawley Boy is coming too."

Strict supervision and play them off one against the other. That, Mrs. Hauksbee, is the secret of our Government.' And I daresay if we could get to The Mussuck's heart we should find that he considers himself a man of the world."

"As he is of the other two things. I like The Mussuck, and I won't have you call him names. He amuses me."

"He has reformed you too, by what appears. Explain the interval of sanity, and hit Tim on the nose with the paper-cutter, please. That dog is too fond of sugar. Do you take milk in yours?"

"No, thanks. Polly, I'm wearied of this life. It's hollow."

"Turn religious, then. I always said that Rome would be your fate."

"Only exchanging half-a-dozen attachés in red for one in black, and if I fasted the wrinkles would come and never, never go. Has it ever struck you, dear, that I'm getting old?"

"Thanks for your courtesy. I'll return it. Ye-es, we are both not exactly—how shall I put it?"

"What we have been. I feel it in my bones. Polly, I've wasted my life."

"As how?"

"Never mind how. I feel it, I want to be a Power before I die."

"Be a Power, then. You've wits enough for anythingand beauty."

Mrs. Hauksbee pointed a teaspoon straight at her hostess: "Polly, if you heap compliments on me like this I shall cease to believe that you're a woman. Tell me how I am to be a Power."

"Inform The Mussuck that he is the most fascinating and slimmest man in Asia, and he'll tell you anything and everything you please."