At that her cousin beamed upon her. “I believe that’s what I like best of all about you, Elsie.”
“You mean nobody ever being nice to me before?”
“No,” Cornelia laughed. “I mean your not admitting that you know it. Of course you do know, because it’s impossible for a girl like you not to realize the effect you have on people; but I love you for pretending you don’t see it.”
“But it’s true,” Elsie insisted. “Until to-night nobody ever——”
“Yes, yes! Go on! It’s very becoming, and it’s what placates the other girls so that you get both sexes in your train, you clever thing!”
“I’m not clever, though,” the visitor protested. “I’m no good at all at pretending things. I’m not——”
“Aren’t you?” Cornelia laughed. “Well, it’s nice of you to try to be modest, then. Your thinking you ought to be is one of your charms. It isn’t the biggest one, though. Everybody saw that one the instant you came downstairs to-night and stood in the drawing-room doorway, just before Father went to bring you in. It was very striking, Elsie.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“That’s right; you oughtn’t to know,” Cornelia said, seriously. “It has to be spontaneous, I suppose, and it probably can’t be imitated or done deliberately.”
“But I didn’t do anything!” Elsie cried.