“Good-looking!” she echoed in an awestruck tone. “Oh, don’t call him that! He’s so much more than that! It seems to me,” she added, in a low voice, as again her eyes wandered in the direction of the two gentlemen, “that I’ve never seen, no, and never even imagined, any face either so handsome or—so—noble. It’s because he’s so good, so much better and greater than other men that he is so handsome.”
The old nurse sat amazed and perplexed by this enthusiasm, which exceeded so far even her own warmth of admiration. She did not dare to smile, although the girl’s tone was so outrageously, childishly vehement as to throw her into considerable astonishment.
“Well, Mr. Rotherfield is generally thought to be nice-looking,” she said, “but I don’t know as he’s all you take him for.”
The girl’s fair face, out of which the glow of colour brought by her enthusiasm had already faded a little, looked at her with a frown of slight perplexity.
“Mr. Rotherfield? Who is that?” she asked.
Old Bessie stared.
“Why, the gentleman you’ve admired so much, the young gentleman that’s walking with Sir Robert. That’s his ward, Mr. Rotherfield.”
A deeper flush than had yet appeared in Rhoda’s face now spread quickly over it, and she lowered her eyelids quickly.
“I didn’t notice him,” she said. “I was speaking about Sir Robert.”
The old nurse uttered a low cry of surprise.