"She puts you down so!" cried that lady, making gestures with the paper-knife she had just been employing on the pages of a Mudie book. "If I tell her that something or other—it doesn't matter what—cost at least a great deal of money, she has a way of smiling at you that is positively insulting! She doesn't trouble to argue; she begins to laugh, and raises her eyebrows. I—I always feel as if she had struck me in the face! I know I oughtn't to speak like this; I hadn't meant to do it, especially to a country-woman of hers, as you are."
"Am I?" said Elsie, in a puzzled voice.
Lady Barnes opened her eyes in astonishment.
"I meant"—the explanation was hurried—"I thought—Mrs. Barnes was a South American? Her mother was Spanish, of course; you see it in Daphne."
"Yes; in her wonderful eyes," said Mrs. French warmly; "and her grace—isn't she graceful! My husband says she moves like a sea-wave. She has given her eyes to the child."
"Ah! and other things too, I'm afraid!" cried Lady Barnes, carried away. "But here is the baby."
For the sounds of a childish voice were heard echoing in the domed hall outside. Small feet came pattering, and the drawing-room door was burst open by Roger Barnes, holding a little girl of nearly two and a half by the hand.
Lady Barnes composed herself. It is necessary to smile at children, and she endeavoured to satisfy her own sense of it.
"Come in, Beatty; come and kiss granny!" And Lady Barnes held out her arms.
But the child stood still, surveyed her grandmother with a pair of startling eyes, and then, turning, made a rush for the door. But her father was too quick for her. He closed it with a laugh, and stood with his back to it. The child did not cry, but, with flaming cheeks, she began to beat her father's knees with her small fists.