"Tired out by the wild dissipation of having a fresh face to look at, a fresh tongue to listen to, last night, I suppose."
"You mean Mr. Wainwright? He certainly is a most agreeable man."
"You are not the only person this morning suffering from his charms," said Mrs. Stothard, with a sniff of depreciation as she pronounced the last words.
"What do you mean? How is Annette? What kind of a night did she have?"
"Bad enough. Oh no, nothing violent, but bad enough for all that. I don't think I ever saw her so excited, so pleasantly excited, before. I could not persuade her to go to bed; and she coaxed me to let her sit up while she talked to me of your visitor. He was so handsome, so charming, so intelligent, she had never seen anyone like him."
"He made himself very agreeable," said Mrs. Derinzy shortly. She was alarmed at the account of these raptures on Annette's part, which boded no good to her favourite project.
"If she were a responsible being, I should say she was in love," said Mrs. Stothard. "Not that anyone is responsible, under those circumstances," she added: a dim remembrance of a cathedral yard, a pile of illuminated drawings, and a cornet in the cavalry, seen through a long vista of intervening years, gave her voice a flat and hollow sound.
"In love! stuff! She sees so few new faces that she's amused for the time, that's all. She will have forgotten the man by this morning."
"She hasn't forgotten him, though you do say 'stuff!' She had a very restless night, tossing and talking in her sleep and laughing to herself. And this morning, directly she woke, she asked me if George Wainwright was still here; and when I told her yes, laughed and kissed my cheek, and fell asleep again quite satisfied."
"George Wainwright, eh?" said Mrs. Derinzy. "She has lost no time in picking up his name."