“Am I?” she said, looking up at him with engaging candor, “I am so inexperienced I don’t know, but someone told me so; dull stones for girls and bright ones for married ladies is what I was told; but I daresay that was all wrong and you know best——”
“I really don’t know what you mean by dull stones,” said Lord Frogmore stiffly.
“Oh, I mean pearls and torquoises and such things, and the others are rubies and emeralds and diamonds; but I don’t at all understand such questions, I only know they are lovely. How am I to thank you, Lord Frogmore?”
“I am quite sufficiently thanked if you are pleased, Miss Ravelstone.”
“Oh, but that is so cold,” said Letitia. “I know what I should do if it was my father, or my uncle, or any old friend. But when it is Lord Frogmore——” She stopped with the same arrested motion which had startled him so when they had first met. Decidedly the girl meant to kiss him. He started rather abruptly to his feet and made her a very elaborate bow.
“I am more than repaid, Miss Ravelstone, if you are good enough to be pleased with my little present,” he said.
“Oh! please call me Letitia—at least,” said the too affectionate bride.
If Lady Sillinger had not come forward at this moment to relieve the strain of the situation by boundless praise and admiration of the necklace, Frogmore did not know to what extremities he might have been driven. He withdrew as soon as he could without any demonstrations of tenderness—and hurrying through the suite of rooms came, to his confusion, upon Lady Frogmore, his stepmother, John’s mother, a woman a little younger than himself, and of whom he had always been a little afraid. She was very large, as so many ladies become in their maturity, and had a way of constantly fanning herself, which was disturbing to most men and to her stepson most of all. But as they had naturally perceived each other some way off there was no avoiding an encounter. The dowager Lady Frogmore had a voice not unlike a policeman’s rattle, and as she spoke her large bosom heaved as if with the effort to bring it forth.
“Well, Frogmore,” she said, “you have been paying your respects to the bride?”
“I have indeed,” he replied, with much gravity, and a nervous glance behind him.