The Train

"Did you ask me?" I demanded, secretly flattered in the extremity of
my youthfulness because she had called me supercilious.

"Well, rather. I'm going to Paris--and in this weather!"

"I am, too."

"Then, let's go together, eh?"

"Delighted. But why have you chosen such a night?"

"I haven't chosen it. You see, I open to-morrow at the Casino de
Paris for fourteen nights, and I suppose I've got to be there. You
wouldn't believe what they're paying me. The Diana company is touring
in the provinces while the theatre is getting itself decorated. I hate
the provinces. Leeds and Liverpool and Glasgow--fancy dancing there!
And so my half-sister--Carlotta, y'know--got me this engagement, and
I'm going to stay with her. Have you met Carlotta?"

"No--not yet." I did not add that I had had reason to think a good
deal about her.

"Well, Carlotta is--Carlotta. A terrific swell, and a bit of a Tartar.
We quarrel every time we meet, which isn't often. She tries to play
the elder sister game on me, and I won't have it. Though she is
elder--very much elder, you now. But I think her worst point is that
she's so frightfully mysterious. You can never tell what she's up to.
Now, a man I met at supper last night told me he thought he had seen
Carlotta in Bloomsbury yesterday. However, I didn't believe that,
because she is expecting me in Paris; we happen to be as thick as
thieves just now, and if she had been in London, she would have looked
me up."