"There," said the German one evening, kindling a great pipe, "enough of politics, De Courval; you are of the insatiably curious. We are to dine to-morrow at the fashionable hour of four with Mistress Wynne and the maid, my Pearl. It is an occasion of some worthiness. She has come to town for this feast, one of her freaks. Did ever you see a great actress?"
"I?" said De Courval. "No, or yes—once, in France, Mademoiselle Mars. We of the religion do not go to the theater. What actress do you speak of?"
"Oh, women—all women; but to-morrow on the stage will be Miss Gainor, become, by pretty courtesy of possibilities declined, Mistress Gainor by brevet—"
De Courval, delighted, cried: "But your little Quaker lady—is she to have a rôle? She seems to me very simple."
"Simple! Yes, here, or at meeting, I daresay. Thou shouldest see her with Friend Waln. Her eyes humbly adore his shoe-buckles—no, his shoe-ties—when he exhorts her to the preservation of plainness of attire, and how through deep wading, and a living travail of soul, life shall be uplifted to good dominion. It is a godly man, no doubt, and a fine, ripe English he talks; and Arthur Howell, too."
"I must hear them."
"You will hear noble use of the great English speech. But best of all are the Free Quakers, like Samuel Wetherill, an apostate, says Friend Pennington with malignant sweetness, but for me a sterling, well-bred gentle, if ever God made one. Ah, then the maid, all godliness and grace, will take his hat and cane and, the head a bit aside, make eyes at him. Ah, fie for shame! And how we purr and purr—actresses, oh, all of them! There is the making of a Quaker Juliet in that girl."
"One would scarce think it. My mother is éprise—oh, quite taken with Miss Margaret, and now, I think, begins a little to understand this household, so new and so wonderful to me and to her. But I meant to ask you something. I have part paid the queer doctor, and the bill, I suppose, is correct. It is long—"
"And large, no doubt."
"And what with a new gown my mother needs and some clothes I must have—"