"I will keep my promise to-morrow," he said, "and Priscilla shall go with us. Poor Priscilla!—poor girl! Rose-pink satin would scarcely be in good taste in Broome street."
The promise he had made was nothing more than a ratification of the old one. They were to see the lions together, and Priscilla was to guide them.
And when the morrow came, he found it, after all, safe enough, and an easy enough matter, to tuck Theodora's small, gloved hand under his arm, when they set out on their tour of investigation and discovery. The girl was pretty enough, too, in her soft, black merino—her "best" dress in Downport—but she was not dazzling. The little round, black-plumed hat was becoming also; but in his now more prosaic mood, he could stand that, too, pretty as it was in an innocent, unconsciously-coquettish way. Theo was never coquettish herself in the slightest degree. She was not world-wise enough for that yet. But she was quite exhilarating to-day; so glad to be out even in the London fog of November; so glad to be taken lion-hunting; so delighted with the shops and their gay windows; so ready to let her young tongue run on in a gay stream of chatter, altogether so bright, and pretty, and joyous, that her escort was fain to be delighted too.
"Guess where we are going to first?" said he. (He had not before openly spoken of Priscilla to her.)
She glanced up into his face, brightly. She remembered what he had told her about his lady friend.
"I don't exactly know the name of the place," she said; "but I think I know the name of the person we are going to see."
"Do you?" was his reply. "Then say it to me—let me hear it."
"Miss Gower," she answered, softly, in a pretty reverence for him. "Miss Priscilla Gower."
He nodded, slightly, with a curious mixture of expressions in his face.
"Yes," he said. "Miss Gower, or rather Miss Priscilla Gower, as you say. Number twenty-three, Broome street; and Broome street is not a fashionable locality, my dear Theodora."