We reached Colonel Letsom’s betimes—neighbourly fashion. In the country you don’t rush in when the dinner’s being put on the table; you like to get a chat beforehand. The sunbeams were slanting into the drawing-room as we entered it. Four of the Letsoms were present, besides the major, and Herbert Tanerton and his wife, for the throat was better. All of us were talking together when the strangers were announced: Sir Dace Fontaine, Miss Fontaine, and Miss Verena Fontaine.
Sir Dace was a tall, heavy man, with a dark, sallow, and arbitrary face; Miss Fontaine was little and pale; she had smooth black hair, and dark eyes that looked straight out at you. Her small teeth were brilliantly white, her chin was pointed. A particularly calm face altogether, and one that could boast of little beauty—but I rather took to it.
Did you ever see a fairy? Verena Fontaine looked like nothing else. A small, fair, graceful girl, with charming manners and pretty words. She had the true golden hair, that is so beautiful but so rare, delicate features, and laughing eyes blue as the summer sky. I think her beauty and her attractions altogether took some of us by surprise; me for one. Bob Letsom looked fit to eat her. The sisters were dressed alike, in white muslin and pink ribbons.
How we went in to dinner I don’t remember, except that Bob and I brought up the rear together. Sir Dace took Mrs. Letsom, I think, and the colonel Mrs. Todhetley; and that beautiful girl, Verena, fell to Tod. Tod! The two girls were about the most self-possessed girls I ever saw; their manners quite American. Not their accent: that was good. Major Letsom and Sir Dace fraternized wonderfully: they discovered that they had once met in the West Indies.
After dinner we had music. The sisters sang a duet, and Mary Ann Letsom a song; and Herbert Tanerton sang, forgetting his throat, Grace playing for him; and they made me sing.
The evening soon passed, and we all left together. It was a warmish night, with a kind of damp smell exhaling from the shrubs and hedges. The young ladies muffled some soft white woollen shawls round their faces, and called our climate a treacherous one. The parson and Grace said good-night, and struck off on the near way to Timberdale; the rest of us kept straight on.
“Why don’t your people always live here?” asked Verena of me, as we walked side by side behind the rest. “By something that was said at dinner I gather that you are not here much.”
“Mr. Todhetley’s principal residence lies at a distance. We only come here occasionally.”
“Well, I wish you stayed here always. It would be something to have neighbours close to us. Of course you know the dreadful little cottage we are in—Maythorn Bank?”
“Quite well. It is very pretty, though it is small.”