Grisel was thinner, she went on thinking. She looked taller in her beautifully fitting chestnut brown skirt and chiffon tan blouse. The girl had changed. She looked more grown up, more of what her mother innocently characterised as "a society girl." Her manner, too, was different. She seemed at once a little bored and excited about something.
She had opened her dressing-case and taken out a variety of little belongings and was darting about the room like, her mother thought, a swallow, settling these things in their old places. A handsomely framed photograph of her father (his gift on her last birthday) she put on the mantelpiece, and turned with a little laugh.
"Isn't Dad looking splendid," she said. "He's been motoring a lot, you know, and it's done him a world of good."
"Oh, I didn't know he went with you," her mother observed, surprised. Grisel took a little silver and enamel cigarette box out of her pocket and put it on the table.
"He didn't go with us," she answered carelessly. "The Crichells had their car, you know, and he and Clara used to knock about a bit."
"Surely, my dear, you don't call Mrs. Crichell by her Christian name?"
"Don't I? I call everybody by their Christian names—everyone does. The old ones hate being 'Miss-ed'—reminds them of their age, you see. Even Elsie's mother hated being called Mrs. Hulbert, but, of course, I wouldn't call her Pansy! She really is old. Must be as old as you, dear, though I must say she doesn't look it."
Oliver Wick glanced quickly at Mrs. Walbridge, but looked away in relief, for he saw that she was untouched by the girl's careless remark, and he realised with a pang of satisfaction that her sensitiveness lay far from such matters as age and looks.
"Did you see much of that Mrs. Crichell?" he asked, as she sat down and lit a cigarette. She laughed.
"Yes. I know you hate her, but she's really not so bad, and Mr. Crichell and she entertained a good deal. They had an awfully nice house there."