Maud: “Mr Morris dropped his spectacles in the stable when he was feeding his new mare. He heard something grind, so he thought she had eaten them by mistake. He sent off for a vet., and he gave her things and charged a guinea, and all the while they were on the dressing-table in his room.”
Dreda: “I’m always losing things! There’s been a perfect fate against me at school this term. It’s not my fault, for I have grown hideously careful, and they all turn up again in time, but it’s most wearing for your nerves!”
Mrs Saxon: “I met your mother in the village on Thursday, Mr Seton. I was glad to see her looking so well.”
Guy Seton: “This brisk weather braces people up. There’s a meet at Newstead Market Square on Monday at eleven. Ought to be a good run.”
Maud: “Mr Morris’s mare cost eighty pounds. Their coachman told our gardener. He said he thought she was gone for sure when the eyeglasses were missing. They’ve got a gold rim.”
Dreda: “People always lose glasses. Flora Mason wears them at school. She draws most beautifully. She had caricatures of all the mistresses inside an atlas. She put them on the back of Balkan States because no one ever looks at them; but there was an earthquake or something, and The Duck turned them up. As a punishment, she made Flora stand up before all the class and draw a copy of her portrait on the board. Flora kept trying to make it pretty, and she said:—
“‘Look at your copy, please, Flora; the nose goes to a point, and is inches larger!’ Flora was purple with embarrassment, and so were we all.”
Guy Seton: “I was wondering if you would care to follow with us on Monday, Miss Saxon? We’d take good care of you. My cousin is a very careful rider, and you need not be at all nervous of being led into awkward places. We could turn back as soon as you were tired.”
Dreda’s gasp of dismay sounded clearly through the room, but Guy Seton was apparently deaf to the sound. Rowena had raised her head from her embroidery, revealing a face of almost startling beauty—cheeks as pink as a wild rose, eyes deeply, darkly blue, lips curving into the sweetest and shyest of smiles.
“Thank you so much. I should love to go. I should not be at all afraid.”