"Then you are not a resident in the neighbourhood?"
"No, ma'am, quite a bird of passage. It is the first time I have ever been in Devonshire. It seems to be a beautiful county indeed."
"Very!"... Mrs. Barnaby heartily hoped that no comparisons would follow, as it was not at all her intention to confess, either on the present or any future occasion, that she had never seen any other; and she therefore rather abruptly changed the conversation by adding, "Do you know, sir, whether there are many outside passengers?... I hope my maid will not be annoyed in any way.... It is the first time I ever put her outside a coach!"
"Poor woman!" thought the young man—"lost her husband, and her money with him, I suppose. I must contrive to look at this tall, slender girl, though."
But Agnes seemed little disposed to give him any opportunity of doing so, for she continued to keep her eyes fixed on the scene without, thus very nearly turning her back on her curious neighbour.
Mrs. Barnaby's first act of active chaperonship was a very obliging one; she perceived the young man's object, and not having the slightest inclination to conceal the beauty of Agnes, which she held to be one of the many advantages with which she was herself surrounded, she said,—
"My dear Agnes, do look at that pretty cottage; it is a perfect picture of rural felicity!"
Agnes obeyed the words, and followed with her eyes the finger that pointed through the opposite window, thus indulging her neighbour with a full view of her exquisite profile. The effect was by no means what Mrs. Barnaby expected; the young man looked, and instead of being led by what he saw into talkative civility, he became very respectfully silent. But respectful silence was not an offering to which Mrs. Barnaby in the most brilliant season of her beauty had ever been accustomed; it puzzled her, till a thought struck her which is worth recording, because it very greatly influenced her conduct and feelings for a long time afterwards. This gentleman, whose attentions for the journey she greatly wished to conciliate, had addressed her in the easy style by which "fast" young men are apt to believe they can propitiate the favour of every woman somewhat under fifty years of age, and somewhat, too, beneath themselves in condition. Our traveller had no fear of blundering when he settled that Mrs. Barnaby belonged to this class; but the instant he caught a glimpse of the countenance of Agnes, he became equally sure that she at least belonged to a higher one. It was not wonderful that poor Miss Compton doubted, when she looked at her, the possibility of her being a descendant of the buxom Martha Wisett, for, excepting something in the form and soft lustre of her dark-brown eyes, her features bore no resemblance to her mother, or her mother's family, but a most decided one to that of her father, who, though a very foolish, hot-headed lieutenant, when we made his acquaintance, was descended from a race of aristocratic ancestors, rather remarkable for their noble and regular cast of features, which appeared indeed to be their least alienable birthright.
The traveller, though a young man, had lived sufficiently in the world to have learned at least the alphabet of character as written on the countenances of those he met, and he spelt gentlewoman so plainly on that of Agnes, that he felt no more right to address her without introduction than he would have done had the stage-coach been an opera-box.
"That's very odd," ... thought Mrs. Barnaby. "She certainly is a most beautiful creature ... quite as handsome as I was even in poor dear Tate's days, and yet the moment he got a sight of her, his pleasant, gay manner, changed all at once, and he now looks as glum as a boy at school.... Though she is my niece, she is not like me; that's certain, ... and who knows but that many men may still prefer my style to hers?... As to this one, at least, it is impossible to doubt it, and it will be great folly in me to set out with a fancy that my face and figure, especially when I get back to dress again, will not stand a comparison with hers. For some years, at any rate, in justice to myself, I will keep this in mind; and not take it for granted that every glance directed towards us is for the child, and not for the woman."