When luncheon was over, aunt offered to show our visitors the rooms she could give them. As they followed her from the room, Miss Dicks turned and said to me in a very audible undertone, "How very good-looking he is!" She jerked her head towards the window where Alan Faulkner stood playing with Sweep. It was extraordinary how that dog had taken to him. Ever since my arrival I had sought in vain to coax her into accompanying me on my walks. She had always preferred to wander alone about uncle's favourite haunts, or to crouch disconsolately on the mat outside his former sanctum; but now she was ready to follow Mr. Faulkner anywhere.
"Oh, hush!" I responded in a whisper to Miss Dicks's remark. "He may hear you."
"Would it matter if he did?" she returned coolly. "Men like to be told that they are good-looking."
"That may be," I replied; "but it is a taste I should not care to gratify."
She laughed.
"Pollie Dicks," called her father from the staircase, "are you coming to choose your room?"
"He means to stay," she said to me with a sagacious nod, "and I've no objection."
When she came downstairs a little later, Aunt Patty told me that Miss Dicks had chosen the room on the left of mine. It was a large room, commanding the front of the house. Her father had had to content himself with a smaller room at the back.
"He seems much pleased with the place," said my aunt, "but his daughter is evidently afraid of finding it dull."
"Do you like them, auntie?" I asked.