"He may be, of course," she says. "But I don't like to see a gay child like you sitting still. You should dance everything for the night."
"Well, as I say, I shall soon," returns Mona, brightening, "because Geoffrey has promised to teach me."
"If I were 'Geoffrey,' I think I shouldn't," says the duchess, meaningly.
"No?" raising an innocent face. "To much trouble, you think, perhaps. But, bless you, Geoffrey wouldn't mind that, so long as he was giving me pleasure." At which answer the duchess is very properly ashamed of both her self and her speech.
"I should think very few people would deem it a trouble to serve you," she says, graciously. "And perhaps, after all, you don't much care about dancing."
"Yes, I do," says Mona, truthfully. "Just now, at least. Perhaps"—sadly—"when I am your age I sha'n't."
This is a betise of the first water. And Lady Rodney, who can hear—and is listening to—every word, almost groans aloud.
The duchess, on the contrary, gives way to mirth, and, leaning back in her chair, laughs softly but with evident enjoyment. Mona contemplates her curiously, pensively.
"What have I said?" she asks, half plaintively. "You laugh, yet I did not mean to be funny. Tell me what I said."
"It was only a little touch of nature," explains her Grace. "On that congratulate yourself. Nature is at a discount these days. And I—I love nature. It is so rare, a veritable philosopher's stone. You only told me what my glass tells me daily,—that I am not so young as I once was,—that, in fact, when sitting next pretty children like you, I am quite old."