The ceremonial of introduction over, and Mrs. Ricketts being at last seated, a very tedious operation, in which the arrangement of cushions, pillows, and footstools played a conspicuous part, that bland lady began, in her very softest of voices,
“This, indeed, repays me, amply, fully repays me! eh, Martha?”
“Quite so, sister,” responded Martha, in a meek whisper.
“A poor invalid as I am, rarely rising from a sofa except to snatch the perfumed odors of a violet in spring, or to listen to the murmurs of a rippling fountain; denied all the excitements of society by a nervous temperament so finely strung as to be jarred by contact, even the remotest, with inferior souls think of what ecstasy a moment like this affords me!”
As Kate was profoundly ignorant to what happy combination of circumstances this blissful state could be attributed, she could only smile courteously, and mutter some vague expressions of her pleasure, satisfaction, and so forth.
“Eve in her own paradise!” exclaimed Mrs. Ricketts, as she turned her eyes from Kate to the gorgeous chamber in which they were seated. “May I ask if the taste of these decorations be yours, Miss Dalton?”
“Lady Hester Onslow's, madam,” said Kate, quietly.
“I declare, I like these hangings better than 'Gobelins' they are lighter and more graceful. You remember, Martha, I told the dear Queen of Saxony that blue velvet would go so well with her small pictures. We discussed the point every morning at breakfast for a week, and the poor dear King at last called us the 'blue devils; 'very happy, wasn't it, Miss Dalton? But he speaks English just like one of ourselves.”
“These are all Dutch pictures, I perceive,” said Purvis, who, with his poodle under his arm, was making a tour of the room, peering into everything, opening books, prying into china jars, and spying into work-boxes, as though in search of some missing article.
“I 'm tired of Wou-Wou-Wou—” Here the poodle barked, doubtless in the belief that he was responding to an invitation. “Down, Fidele! Wou-ver-mans,” gulped out Purvis. “He 's always the same.”