Come sounding through the toun.
So she ended in a dying sweetness with notes as deep as doom, and would sing no more, and the silence that followed was better than all words. The Duchess drew her near and kissed her cheek without any.
Indeed, Emma spoke little that night. She was conscious herself, to a certain extent, that she was on her promotion. Conscious, too, that there were faults of speech which great ladies might view with scorn unsoftened by the bright beauty which made even these a naïve enchantment to men. She was therefore at her best, nothing breaking out of control; pliable, gentle, unassuming; in all things obedient and attentive to Sir William.
He drew near the Duchess while Emma at Lady Diana’s request poised her tambourine for a rapid sketch in Mr. Walpole’s interest. The others had gathered about the pretty sight.
“Your opinion, madam?”
“I am charmed, dazzled. She is a revelation of the most exquisite beauty. There is genius, Sir William. I never saw her like.”
“Then you don’t condemn me, madam? You don’t think me the infatuated fool I am called in some circles?”
“I think you have shown yourself a man of supreme taste. That girl—take care she does not leave you some day and take Europe as a lover instead! Every great capital would be at her feet.”
“You forget she loves me. She will not leave me,” he said complacently. The Duchess looked at him with pitying eyes.
“You forget, my friend, I fear, that you are sixty, and she—” She pointed with her fan at the radiant figure, incarnate youth, and the men crowding about her to admire. It struck like the chill of death, as a truth known with secret fear to ourselves will do when repeated from other lips.