look at, sat in an attitude full of
comfortable indolence, with a small pug in her lap, who bounced at
Rainham with a bark of friendly recognition. A young lady, at the
other side of the room (she was at least young by courtesy), who was
pouring out tea, stopped short in this operation to greet the new
visitor with a little soft exclamation, in which pleasure and
surprise mingled equally. The old lady also looked up smiling. She
seemed both good-natured and distinguished, and she had the air--a
sort of tired complacency--of a person who has been saying witty
things for a whole afternoon, and is at last in the enjoyment of a
well-deserved rest. She extended both hands to Rainham, who held
them for a minute in his own, silently smiling down at her, before
he released them to greet her companion.

She was a tall, pale girl in a black dress, whom at first sight the
impartial observer might easily declare to be neither pretty nor
young. As a matter of fact, she was younger than she seemed, for she
was barely five-and-twenty, although her face and manner belonged
to a type which, even in girlhood, already forestalls some of the
gravity and reserve that arrive with years. As for her beauty, there
were those who disputed it altogether; and yet even when one had
gone so far as to declare that Mary Masters was plain, one had, in
justice, to add that she possessed none the less a distinct and
delicate charm of her own. It was a daisy-like charm differing in
kind from the charm of Eve Sylvester, which was that of a violet or
a child, perpetually perfuming the air. It could be traced at
last--for she had not a good feature--to the possession of a pair
of very soft, and shy, brown eyes, and of a voice, simply agreeable
in conversation, which burgeoned out in song into the richest
contralto imaginable, causing her to be known widely in society as
"the Miss Masters who sings." Indeed, she had a wonderful musical
talent, which she had cultivated largely. Her playing had even
approved itself to the difficult Rubinstein; and, although she had a
certain reputation for cleverness, the loss to society when she left
the music-stool to mingle in it was generally felt not to be met by
a corresponding gain; and, indeed, as a rule, people did not
consider her separately. The generality were inclined simply to
accept her, in relation to her aunt, Lady Garnett, with whom she had
lived since she was a girl of sixteen, as any other of that witty
o