"The dancing-master?" said Cousin Walpole, much interested.
"No; her ravissante amie."
Cousin Walpole, conscious that he had made a mistake, betook himself to the portrait near by. "Superb woman!" he murmured, contemplating it. "Superb!"
The portrait represented the authoress of Corinne standing, her talented head crowned by a majestic aureole of yellow satin turban, whose voluminous folds accounted probably for the scanty amount of material left for the shoulders and arms.
"If I could have had the choice," said Miss Pitcher, pensively gazing at this portrait, "I would rather have been that noble creature than any one else on history's page."
Later they went down to the old garden. It stretched back behind the house for some distance, shut in by a high stone wall. A long, straight alley, shaded by even rows of trees, went down one side like a mathematical line; on the other there was some of the stiff landscape-gardening of the last century. In the open space in the centre was a moss-grown fish-pond, and near the house a dignified little company of clipped trees. They strolled down the straight walk: this time Ford was with Mrs. Winthrop, while Sylvia, Mr. Percival, and Cousin Walpole were in front.
"I suppose she used to walk here," observed Mrs. Winthrop.
"In her turban," suggested Ford.
"Perhaps she has sat upon that very bench—who knows?—and mused," said Sylvia, imaginatively.
"Aloud, of course," commented her nephew. But these irreverent remarks were in undertone; only Mrs. Winthrop could hear them.