"My dear Marian, as if I had not already explained to you how utterly impossible it was for me to start on my holidays till late yesterday afternoon! I took the first train after I was at liberty----"
"And reached Fairlawn just as papa and mamma were sitting down to dinner. Although you professed to be so exceedingly delighted to see them, mamma told me that she never saw you pull such a dismal face as you did last evening. I wonder why?"
"Then you may have the pleasure of wondering, because I shan't tell you why."
"Amiable youth!"
"But why didn't Mrs. Drelincourt take you to the ball herself, instead of leaving you to be chaperoned by Mrs. Delisle?"
"Mamma rarely goes anywhere. In the first place, as you know, her health is very delicate, and, in the second, she wouldn't go anywhere without papa."
"Is Mr. Drelincourt, now that he has come back to England, as much of a recluse as he was during the time he lived abroad?"
"Just as much. His coming home has made no difference in his mode of life. We see no company, or next to none, and he and mamma visit nowhere."
"It seems to me that it must be rather a dull sort of life to lead."
"Not at all. You forget for how many years they led the same kind of life abroad. Wet or fine, papa goes out on horseback for a couple of hours every morning. Then, all forenoon he is busy in his laboratory. You may or may not know that he is a fellow of more than one learned society. In the afternoon he and mamma--sometimes taking me with them--drive or walk, and for the evening we have books, chess, and music."