SCENE XIX
Mistress Bellairs took her departure early.
Attired in unusually sober colours, floating in an atmosphere of chastened, matronly dignity, she had shown herself this evening, thought Lord Verney, quite worthy to be his mother's daughter-in-law.
"Monstrous dull," Lady Flyte called the pretty widow's demeanour.
Beyond a gavotte with Lord Verney, she had not danced, but sat for half-an-hour on the chair next to Lady Maria, who presented her with the vision of a shoulder-blade which had seen better days, and an impenetrability of hearing which baffled even Kitty's undaunted energy.
When Verney had tucked her up in her sedan she insisted upon the young peer allowing her to proceed home unescorted.
"Indeed," said she, "I pray you, nay, I order you. People talk so in this giddy place, and have you not your aged aunt to wait upon? I am sure," said Mistress Kitty piously, "that your dear mother would wish it thus."
He submitted. He had no doubt that his mother would indeed entirely concur with such sentiments, and blessed his Kitty for her sweet reasonableness.
"Good-night, then," she said, thrusting her pretty face out of the window with a very tender and gentle smile.