“Come here, child, and sit by me,” said Miss Jane, making room on the sofa, as her protégée entered.
“Thank you, I prefer a seat near the window.”
Dr. Grey sat in a large chair in the centre of the floor, with Muriel on an ottoman close to him, and Mr. Granville leaned over the back of the chair, while Miss Dexter shared Miss Jane’s old-fashioned ample sofa. In full view of the whole party, Salome seated herself at a little distance, and, with admirably assumed nonchalance, began to enclose and sew up the geranium-seeds, in some pretty, colored paper bags, prepared for the purpose.
After a few minutes Mr. Granville sauntered across the room, looked at the cuckoo clock, and finally went over to the window, where he leaned against the facing and watched Salome’s slender white fingers.
She was dressed in a delicate muslin, striped with narrow pink lines, and flounced at the bottom of the skirt, and wore a ribbon sash of the same color; while in the broad braids of hair raised high on her head, she had fastened a superb half-blown Baron Provost rose, just where two long glossy curls crept down. The puffed sleeves, scarcely reaching the elbows, displayed the finely rounded white arms, and the exactness 204 with which the airy muslin fitted her form, showed its symmetrical outline to the greatest advantage.
Muriel touched her guardian, and whispered,—
“Did you ever see Salome look so beautiful? Her coiffure to-night is almost Parisian, and how very becoming!”
Dr. Grey was studying the innocent, happy countenance of his unsuspecting ward, and he could not repress a sigh, when, turning his eyes towards Salome, he noticed the undisguised admiration in Mr. Granville’s earnest gaze.
A nameless dread made him take Muriel’s hand and lead her to the piano.
“Play something for me. I am music-hungry.”