"Yes—and no! I have met her once. She is a Miss Wolfe, who has come to be a sort of companion to Mrs. Peyton. A singular-looking girl, with a most interesting face. I want to see her again; and yet,—somehow,—I am rather afraid of her."
"Is she formidable, this she-wolf?"
"Not formidable, but—well, I don't know how to describe her. She impresses me as different from anybody I have ever seen. Wild is not the word; Rita was wild, but it was something totally different."
"Peggy is wild, too," said Hugh, "wild as a mountain goat, or was, before you took her in hand, Margaret. Is this young lady like Peggy?"
"Oh, not in the very least. She is not shy, not a bit; not shy, and yet not bold. She seems simply absolutely without self-consciousness; it is as if she said and did exactly what she felt like doing, with no thought as to whether it was—well, customary or not. I am afraid I am rather conventional, Cousin—I mean Hugh; not in thought, I hope, but—in temperament, perhaps. This girl strikes me very strangely; that is the only way I can describe her. Yet she attracted me strongly, the only time I saw her, which was the very day you came, by the way. I ought to have gone over to see her before this. I think I will go this evening, while you and Uncle John are having your after-supper smoke."
"I think I would," said Hugh Montfort.