A shade crosses Marcia's face. Her eyelids quiver. Although the shaft (be it said to Molly's praise) was innocently shot, still it reached her cousin's heart, for has she not failed in attracting the one man she so passionately loves?
"I really hardly know," Miss Amherst says, coldly. "I—don't go in for that sort of thing. And you,—do you paint?"
"Oh, no."
"You play the piano, perhaps?"
"I try to, now and then."
("'The Annen Polka,' and on memorable occasions 'The Battle of Prague,'" thinks Marcia, comfortably.) "You sing," she says.
"I do," with hesitation.
("'Rosalie the Prairie Flower,' and the 'Christy Minstrels' generally," concludes Marcia, inwardly.) "That is charming," she says out loud: "it is so long since we have had any one here with a talent for music."
"Oh," says Molly, biting a little bit off her nail, and then examining her finger in an embarrassed fashion, "you must not use the word talented, that implies so much, and I—really you know I—— Why," starting to her feet, and regaining all her usual impulsive gayety, "that is surely Philip walking across the lawn, and he said he was so busy. Can we not go out, Marcia? The day is so lovely."
"If you want Philip, I dare say one of the servants will bring him to you," says Marcia, insolently.