"I feel assured, Terence," says Miss Priscilla, with much dignity, "that under no circumstances could a niece of mine show too much of her——her——"
Here Miss Priscilla blushes, and breaks down.
"Legs?" suggests Terry, politely.
"But who was the strange young man?" asks Miss Penelope, curiously.
"Our friend of the hay-cart said his name was Desmond, and that he was nephew to the master of the house behind the big gates," returns Kit, fluently.
"Desmond!" says Miss Priscilla, greatly agitated. "Let me never hear you mention that name again! It has been our bane! Forget you have ever been so unfortunate as to encounter this young man; and if ill luck should ever drive him across your path again, remember you do not—you never can—know him."
"But I'm certain he will know Monica if he sees her again," says Kit. "He stared at her as if she had seven heads."
"No wonder, considering her equivocal position. And as to knowing Monica, I'm not certain of that, of course, but I'm utterly positive he could swear to her shoes in a crowd," says Terence, with unholy delight. "He was enchanted with them, and with the clocks on her stockings: I think he was taking the pattern of them."
"He was not," says Monica, almost weeping. "He couldn't see them. I was too high up."
"What will you bet he doesn't know the color of them?" asks her tormentor, with a fresh burst of appreciation of the undignified scene. "When I see him again I'll ask him."