The yellow book: an illustrated quarterly (10.1896)

Kathy

By Oswald Sickert

a little after nine o’clock one evening towards the end of

August, Mrs. Lee-Martin, her daughters Eva and Clara, her

niece, Katharine Shinner, and a kind of cousin, Huddleston, were
all sitting in the vestibule attached to the ball-room of the Dieppe
Casino. A waltz had just been played, and the next dance was
the “ Berline,” an invention of the dancing master’s which the
Lee-Martins did not know, so they had an interval for watching
and discussing the people.

They had been in Dieppe a week, and the chief object of their
discussions was a young man of twenty, a Mr. Reynolds, whom
they all disliked. He was not tall, he had dark brown curly hair
which parted well in the middle, a taking face with clear complexion
and clean features ; he dived and danced admirably ; he was
always exquisitely dressed, his manners were easy, and he was a
great favourite with his partners. Eva and Clara had quarrelled
with everything about him, including his long brown overcoat
with a waist, which was so effeminate. Huddleston, who dressed
very quietly, generously defended him. Mrs. Lee-Martin did not
fancy the style of some of the girls with whom Reynolds danced,
and she was just as well pleased her girls did not like him.

Kathy exceeded the rest of the party in her objection to

Reynolds;