‘Anyway,’ John said, ‘it’s all rather new to one, the eighteenth century in Paris, and I find the world she describes – the intrigue, the etiquette, the romance – rather fascinating.’
‘Fascinating!’ Sir Christopher roared. ‘I find it a repulsive world – all those menacing women controlling everything, what with their salons and their incessant fornication. In fact, I think the eighteenth century altogether a terribly sterile period, except for the music, and none of the decent eighteenth-century music – Handel, Mozart or Gluck – is French. And as for the art! Well, how anyone can take eighteenth-century French art seriously is beyond one. Watteau, Boucher, Fragonard – it’s all the sort of underbred trumpery one detests.’
Mercifully, the ringing of the doorbell absolved John from the burd
