"And suppose they were disobeyed?" asked Churchill again.
"Then--but I won't tell you what would happen! I don't think you'll ever have the chance of knowing; do you think you shall? Not that I like amiable people generally--do you? Your blue-eyed girls, with colourless hair like blotting-paper, and--but I forgot I was talking to an author. I suppose you're making fun of all I say?"
"On the contrary," said Churchill, struggling to keep his gravity, and producing a small memorandum-book, "I purpose making a note of that description for use on a future occasion. There is a spiteful simplicity in that phrase about 'blotting-paper hair' which is really worth embalming in a leader."
"Now I know you're laughing, and I hate to be laughed at--"
"By no means; I subscribe the roll. I am now one of the âmes damnées, sworn to obey the spell of the sorceress; and the spell is--?"
"Nothing. Never mind. You will know easily enough when it is once uttered. Now they're coming back to us, and I've lost my glove. Have you seen it? How very absurd!"
As she spoke, they came up with Lyster and Miss Townshend, who were waiting for them at a gate leading into the Grange lands.
"How slowly you walk, Miss Lexden!" said Lyster; "Miss Townshend thought you never would come up with us."
Miss Townshend, with much curl-tossing and laughter, declared she had never said any thing of the kind.
"Quite otherwise," replied Barbara; "from the earnest manner in which you were carrying on the conversation, there could be no doubt that it was you who were going ahead."