“Twist the ends of your veil, dear, they are sticking out... Oh dear, dear, she is at home! I do have such shocking bad fortune.”
She trailed out of the carriage sighing so deeply that I was terrified lest the servant should hear. I shall never call on people unless I want to see them. It does seem such a farce to grumble because they are at home, and then to be sweet and pleasant when you meet.
Mrs Greaves was certainly very silent, but I liked her. She looked worn and tired, but she had beautiful soft brown eyes which looked at you and seemed to say a great deal more than her lips. Do you know the kind of feeling when you like people and know they like you in return? I was perfectly certain Mrs Greaves had taken a fancy to me before she said, “I should like to introduce my daughter to you,” and sent a message upstairs by the servant. I wondered what the girl would be like; a young edition of Mrs Greaves might be pretty, but there was an expression on mother’s face which made me uncertain. Then she came in, a pale badly dressed girl, with a sweet face and shy awkward manners. Her name was Rachel, and she took me to see the conservatory, and I wondered what on earth we should find to say. Of course she asked first of all—
“Are you fond of flowers?” and I remembered mother’s rule and replied, “Yes, I love them.” That was four words, but it didn’t seem to take us much further somehow, so I made a terrific effort and added, “But I don’t know much about their names, do you?”
“Yes, I think I do. I feel as if it was a kind of courtesy we owe them for giving us so much pleasure. We take it as a slight if our own friends mispronounce or misspell our own names, and surely flowers deserve as much consideration from us,” quoth she.
Goodness! how frightfully proper and correct. I felt so quelled that there was no more spirit left in me, and I followed her round listening to her learned descriptions and saying, “How pretty!” “Oh, really!” in the most feeble manner you can imagine.
All the while I was really looking at her more than the flowers, and discovering lots of things. Number one—sweet eyes just like her mother’s; number two—sweet lips with tiny little white teeth like a child’s; number three—a long white throat above that awful collar. Quotient—a girl who ought to be quite sweet, but who made herself a fright. I wondered why! Did she think it wrong to look nice—but then, if she did, why did she love the flowers just for that very reason? Rachel Greaves! I thought the name sounded like her somehow—old-fashioned, and prim, and grey; but the next moment I felt ashamed, for, as if she guessed what I was thinking, she turned to me and said suddenly—
“Will you tell me your name? I ought to know it to add to my collection, for you are like a flower yourself.”
Wasn’t it a pretty compliment? I blushed like anything, and said—
“It must be a wild one, I’m afraid. I look hot-housey this afternoon, for I’m dressed up to pay calls, but really I have just left school, and feel as wild as I can be. You mustn’t be shocked if you meet me in a short frock some morning tearing about the fields.”