he
drawing-room, where the ladies were so much at their ease, on low couches
and ottomans, that Phoebe stood transfixed by the novelty of a
drawing-room treated with such freedom as was seldom permitted in even
the schoolroom at Beauchamp, when Miss Fennimore was in presence.

'Phoebe, bright Phoebe!' cried Lucilla, pouncing on both her hands, and
drawing her towards the other room, 'it is ten ages since I saw you, and
you must bring your taste to aid my choice of the fly costume. Did you
hear, Rashe? I've a bet with Lord William that I appear at the ball all
in flies. Isn't it fun?'

'Oh, jolly!' cried Horatia. 'Make yourself a pike-fly.'

'No, no; not a guy for any one. Only wear a trimming of salmon-flies,
which will be lovely.'

'You do not really mean it?' said Phoebe.

'Mean it? With all my heart, in spite of the tremendous sacrifice of
good flies. Where honour is concerned--'

'There, I knew you would not shirk.'

'Did I ever say so?'--in a whisper, not unheard by Phoebe, and affording
her so much satisfaction that she only said, in a grave, puzzled voice,
'The hooks?'

'Hooks and all,' was the answer. 'I do nothing by halves.'

'What a state of mind the fishermen will be in! proceeded Horatia.
'You'll have every one of them at your feet.'

'I shall tell them that two of a trade never agree. Come, and let us
choose.' And opening a drawer, Lucilla took out her long parchment book,
and was soon eloquent on the merits of the doctor, the butcher, the
duchess, and all her other radiant fabrications of gold pheasants'
feathers, parrot plumes, jays' wings, and the like. Phoebe could not
help admiring their beauty, though she was perplexed all the while,
uncomfortable on Robert's account, and yet not enough assured of the
usages of the London world to be certain whether this were unsuitable.
The Charteris family, though not of the most _elite_ circles of all, were
in one to which the Fulmorts had barely the _entree_, and the ease and
dash of the young ladies, Lucilla's superior age, and caressing
patronage, all made Phoebe in her own eyes too young and ignorant to pass
an opinion. She would have known more about the properties of a
rectangle or the dangers of a paper currency.

Longing to know what Miss Charlecote thought, she stood, answering as
little as possible, until Rashe had been summoned to the party in the
outer room, and Cilly said, laughing, 'Well, does she astonish your
infant mind?'