Creeping away with bowed head and beating heart, Honor met Soeur Séraphine coming along the corridor with her light, swift tread. At sight of her, the Sister’s face, tranquil and beautiful, broke into its lovely smile, and Honor started, it was so like the pictured face that had smiled at her a moment; so like, yet—ah, how different!
“Tiens!” said Soeur Séraphine. “My little Moriole, I was seeking thee. The hour approaches, and thy toilette is not yet made. Thou hast been weeping, my child. I could well weep too, at losing thee, but the smile is the better fashion, see’st thou! As Monsieur thy father observed, ‘Bokope,’ my Moriole! Come then, and I will tie thy ribbon for thee!”
“First,” said Mrs. Damian, “we will inspect the tokens.”
“The tokens?” repeated Honor, slightly bewildered; Mrs. Damian was in one of her most swooping moods, and had already taken her breath away twice.
“Of affection!” replied the lady. “Tokens of affection; souvenirs; gimcracks; anything you choose to call them. This way, my dear!”
She led the way into a little boudoir, which seemed to be furnished largely with tissue paper and parcels, and motioned Honor toward a table on which lay a number of small objects. Honor bent over them in wonder and delight. Nine heart-shaped lockets of rock-crystal, each containing a tiny likeness of herself. Beside them, a larger print of her in a silver frame.
“Oh! how lovely!” cried Honor, clasping her hands. “How perfectly lovely! Are they—do they—”
“They are for your schoolmates, naturally. You said there were nine of them? ‘Nine homesick puppies, in nine vehicles, straying sadly down the road to Peking.’[2] Quotation; contains a buried city. H’m! Well! Yes. The large one is for the two good ladies, who do not wear gimcracks. Well? Are you pleased?”
[2] Mrs. Hugh Fraser.