"Dear madam," cried Miss Allonby, "I am overjoyed!" then kissed her step-mother vigorously and left the room, casting in passage an arch glance at Mr. Erwyn.
"O vulgarity!" said Lady Allonby, recovering her somewhat rumpled dignity, "the sweet child is yet unpolished. But, I suppose, we may regard the matter as settled?"
"Yes," said Mr. Erwyn, "I think, dear lady, we may with safety regard the matter as settled."
"Dorothy is of an excitable nature," she observed, and seated herself upon the divan; "and you, dear Mr. Erwyn, who know women so thoroughly, will overlook the agitation of an artless girl placed in quite unaccustomed circumstances. Nay, I myself was affected by my first declaration,"'
"Doubtless," said Mr. Erwyn, and sank beside her. "Lord Stephen was very moving."
"I can assure you," said she, smiling, "that he was not the first."
"I' gad," said he, "I remember perfectly, in the old days, when you were betrothed to that black-visaged young parson—"
"Well, I do not remember anything of the sort," Lady Allonby stated; and she flushed.
"You wore a blue gown," he said.
"Indeed?" said she.