"It was while you were away. Miss Gallup had been ill and I went to ask for her and he was there, and he walked home with me . . ."
Mrs Ffolliot raised her eyebrows.
"Oh, you think it funny too? It couldn't be helped—old Miss Gallup seemed to think it was the proper thing and sent him—and father was waiting for me at the gate and was awfully cross. . . . Mother, how did you persuade him to let you ask Mr Gallup?"
Mrs Ffolliot turned to her dressing-table and began to collect fan and handkerchief. She looked in the glass and saw Mary behind her, eager, radiant, slim, upright, and gloriously young. She began to see why father was so awfully cross. There was more excuse than usual.
"Why don't you answer me, mother? didn't you hear what I said?"
"I heard, my darling. Father needed no persuasion. He simply changed his mind; but I can't think why you never told me you had met Mr Gallup already."
Mary blushed. The warm colour dyed forehead and neck and ears, and faded into the exceedingly white chest and shoulders, revealed to the world for the first time.
Mrs Ffolliot saw all this in the glass, wondered if she could have imagined it, and turned to face her daughter.
"Mother"—what honest eyes the child had, to be sure—"it wasn't the first time I'd spoken to him."
"Really, Mary, you are very mysterious——"