When Franceline, in her white muslin dress, floated into the drawing-room, like a summer cloud, the Newfoundland was standing on the hearth-rug, with its eyes fixed expectantly on the door. Lady Anwyll was generally down long before her son. Ponce took an age to get out of one set of clothes and into another; but he had the start of her to-day.
“You have had a nice drive from Dullerton,” he began; how else could he begin? “But I fear the weather is on the turn; those clouds over the common look mischievous.”
“Are you weatherwise?” inquired Franceline, following his eyes to the window.
“Not he, my dear! He’s not wise in anything!” answered a voice from behind her.
“Mother, this is positively too bad of you! I protest against your taking away my character in this fashion, before I have a chance of making one with Miss Franceline. You begin by making me out the laziest dog in Christendom, and now you would rob me of my one intellectual quality! You know I am weatherwise! They call me Girouette in the 10th, because I can tell to a feather how the wind is blowing; ’pon my honor they do, Miss Franceline!”
Franceline was going to assure him of her entire faith in this assertion when dinner was announced, and they crossed the hall into the dining-room.
“Now, tell us something about where you’ve been and what you’ve seen and done,” said the dowager; “and try and be as entertaining as you can, for you see there is no one else to amuse my young friend.”
“I’m sure I should be very proud; I wish I could remember something amusing to tell; but that’s the deuce of it, the more a fellow wants to be pleasant the less he can. Do you care to hear about fishing?” This was addressed to Franceline. There was something so boyish in his manner, such an entire absence of conceit or affectation, that, in spite of other deficiencies, she liked the shy hussar, and felt at ease with him.
“I dare say I should if I understood it at all; but I do not. But I am always curious to know about foreign places and people,” she said.