“We sat in easy-chairs. I faced the portrait of a very beautiful lady after whom Cicely Cardew is called.”
“Of course I know her well—I mean her picture,” said Isabel. “That is a Gainsborough. Didn’t you admire it?”
“Yes; but I want to look at it again; I’m going to do the gallery another day, and on that occasion I think I shall ask Cicely to accompany me.”
“Why, what do you mean? Don’t you like our sweet little Merry?”
“Like her? I quite love her,” said Maggie; “but the fact is, girls, I did my duty by her this morning, and now I want to do my duty by Cicely.”
“Oh Mags, you are so mysterious!” said Molly; “but come upstairs and take off your hat, for the gong will sound for lunch in a moment.”
Maggie went upstairs, Molly and Isabel following her. “Come into my room, girls,” she said. Then she added, dropping her voice, “I think those bracelets are pretty secure.”
Molly colored. Isabel looked down.
“You will never succeed,” said Molly.
Then Isabel said, “Even if you do, I don’t think we ought, perhaps, to—to take them, for it would seem as though they were a sort of—sort of—bribe.”