The Gioconda Smile

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The Gioconda Smile

“Miss Spence will be down directly, sir.” “Thank you,” said Mr. Hutton, without turning round.

Janet Spence’s parlourmaid was so ugly—ugly on purpose, it always seemed to him, malignantly, criminally ugly—that he could not bear to look at her more than was necessary. The door closed. Left to himself, Mr.

Hutton got up and began to wander round the room, looking with meditative eyes at the familiar objects it contained.

Henry Hutton, a prosperous English landowner, flirts with Miss Janet Spence, an unmarried woman in her late thirties.

After toying with her affections, Hutton hurriedly departs to take home his young Cockney mistress, Doris, and then to return to his wife, who is an almost complete invalid.

Mr. and Mrs. Hutton have reached an impasse in their marriage: He is terminally bored with the relationship, while she approaches life with the querulous disapproval of the chronically ill.

In an effort to change the routine, and to provide some secret spice to daily events, Hutton invites Miss Spence to dine with them.

The Gioconda Smile

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