"She is good style, thank Heaven!" thought Lady Marabout, as she went forward, with her white soft hands, their jewels flashing in the light, outstretched in welcome. "My dear child, how much you are like your mother! You must let me be fond of you for her sake, first, and then—for your own!"
The conventional thought did not make the cordial utterance insincere. The two ran in couples—we often drive such pairs, every one of us—and if they entail insincerity, Veritas, vale!
"Madre mia, I called to inquire if you have survived the anxiety of last night, and to know what jeune sauvage or feir religieuse you may have had sent you for the galvanizing of Belgravia?" said Carruthers, paying his accustomed visit in his mother's boudoir, and throwing macaroons at Bijou's nose.
"My dear Philip, I hardly know; she puzzles me. She's what, if she were a man, I should classify as a detrimental."
"Is she awkward?"
"Not in the least. Perfect manners, wherever she learned them."
"Brusque?"
"Soft as a gazelle. Very like her mother."
"Brown?"
"Fair as that statuette, with a beautiful bloom; lovely gold hair, too, and hazel eyes."