Miss Browne having to leave the room some few minutes later Olga raises herself from the lounging position she has been in, with her hands clasped behind her head, and says, slowly,—
"I don't think she is so plain, after all."
"Neither do I," says Monica, eagerly, "there is something so sweet about her expression."
"I am perfectly certain that man Peter is awfully in love with her," says Mrs. Herrick solemnly, "and that without the [slightest] thought of her money."
"What would he think of her money for?" says Madam O'Connor, testily, who had firmly believed him a fortune-hunter only two minutes ago. "Isn't she a jewel in herself?"
"By the bye, where is our Bella all this time?" says Olga, suddenly. "It now occurs to me that of course we have been missing her all this time."
"I know," says Monica, mysteriously: "she is asleep,—[getting] herself up for her Lady Teazle. I was running along the corridor, outside her room, half an hour ago, when her mother came out on tiptoe and implored me to go gently, lest I should wake her."
"Gentle dove," says Mrs. Herrick.
"I shall go and dance the can-can up and down that corridor this moment," says Mrs. Bohun, rising to her feet with fell determination in her eye.
"I think you had all better go to your rooms and get ready for dinner. It is painfully early to-night," says Madam, "on account of all this nonsense of Olga's. But no dressing mind, as I have told the men to come as they are. There will be plenty of that by and by."