"Mrs. Thorn, isn't she lovely?"
Mrs. Thorn's smile at Fleda might almost have been called that, it was so full of benevolent pleasure. But she spoiled it by her answer. "I don't believe I am the first one to find it out.".
"But what are you looking so sober for?" Constance went on, taking Fleda's screen from her hand and fanning her diligently with it "you don't talk. The gravity of Miss Ringgan's face casts a gloom over the brightness of the evening. I couldn't conceive what made me feel chilly in the other room till I looked about and found that the shade came from this corner; and Mr. Thorn's teeth, I saw, were chattering."
"Constance," said Fleda, laughing and vexed, and making the reproof more strongly with her eyes "how can you talk so?"
"Mrs. Thorn, isn't it true?"
Mrs. Thorn's look at Fleda was the essence of good humour.
"Will you let Lewis come and take you a good long ride to- morrow?"
"No, Mrs. Thorn, I believe not I intend to stay perseveringly at home to-morrow, and see if it is possible to be quiet a day in New York."
"But you will go with me to the concert to-morrow night? both of you and hear Truffi; come to my house and take tea, and go from there? will you, Constance?"
"My dear Mrs. Thorn," said Constance, "I shall be in ecstasies, and Miss Ringgan was privately imploring me last night to find some way of getting her to it. We regard such material pleasures as tea and muffins with great indifference, but when you look up after swallowing your last cup you will see Miss Ringgan and Miss Evelyn, cloaked and hooded, anxiously awaiting your next movement. My dear Fleda, there is a ring!"