"Nonsense!" said Val. "You can't deny, Oaks, but her nose turns up!"
"I don't care whether it turns up or down!" yelled Mr. Oaks, "or whether she's got any nose at all! I know it's perfect, and her eyes are like the stars of heaven, and her complexion the loveliest olive I ever looked at!"
"Olive!" said Mr. Blake. "I'll take my oath it's yellow, and she's as skinny as our Jo there."
"I'm obliged to you, Mr. Blake, for the compliment, I'm sure!" exclaimed Miss Jo, flashing fire at the speaker; "and I think you might have a little more politeness than running down the poor young lady, if her nose does turn up. Sure, she is not to blame, poor creature! if she is ugly!"
"But, I tell you, ma'am," roared Mr. Oaks, growing scarlet in the face, "she is not ugly! She's beautiful! She's divine! She's an angel!—that's what she is!"
"Well," said Mr. Blake, resignedly, "if she's an angel, all I've got to say is, that angels ain't much to my taste. She is not half as pretty as yourself, Laura; and now I want you to dance with me, after that."
Miss Blair, with a radiant face, put her pretty white hand on Val's coat-sleeve, and marched him off. A quadrille was just forming, and they took their places.
"So she's really not handsome, Val? What is she like?"
"Oh, she's tall and thin, and straight as a poplar, and she has big, flashing black eyes, and tar-black hair, all braided round her head, and a haggard sort of look that I don't admire. I dare say, Lady Macbeth looked something like her; but she is not the least like poor Nathalie Marsh."
"Ah! poor Nathalie! dear Nathalie!" Laura sighed. "It seems like yesterday since that night last May, at Jeannette McGregor's, when she was the belle and the heiress of Redmon, we all thought, and Captain Cavendish came for the first time. I remember, too, Miss Rose arrived that night, and we were asking Charley—poor Charley!—what she looked like. And now to think of all the changes that have taken place! I declare, it seems heartless of us to be dancing and enjoying ourselves here, after all!"