"I have no doubt," says I, "but what you are troubled with the vapours," and got a haughty glance of contempt for my pains. And after dinner what does she do but sit in great state in the drawing-room, with her little feet daintily crossed upon a velvet cushion, fanning herself languidly, and talking of French gowns, as the latest Newsletter represented them, and the staleness of matrimony, and such-like fashionable matters.
"But no doubt," says she with a shrug of the shoulders, and a pretty voice of insolence, "Mr. Clavering will marry;" she paused for a second. "And what will the wife be like?"
I was taken aback by the question, and from looking on her face, I looked to the ground or rather to the velvet cushion by which I happened to be sitting. It was for that reason, that not knowing clearly what I should say, I answered absently—
"She must have a foot."
"I suppose so," she replied, "and why not two?"
"Yes!" I continued slowly, "she must certainly have a foot."
"And maybe a head with eyes and a mouth to it," says she; "or does not your modesty ask so much?"
"I wonder you can walk on them at all," said I.
The heels were popped on the instant demurely under the hoop petticoat.
"Owl," she said in a very soft, low, reflective voice, addressing the word in a sort of general way to the four walls of the room.