veil, spectacles, and cloak
came off in succession; her dark hair curled in little rings round her
forehead, and the round young throat rose like a pillar above the
quaintly-cut bodice. If Lilias had been in her sister's place, she
would have reflected that her antique costume was appropriate to her
surroundings, but such thoughts as these never occurred to honest Nan.
She was merely concerned to see that the last remains of powder were
wiped away, and, being satisfied on this point, smiled at Mr Vanburgh
in friendly fashion.

"That's better!" he said cheerfully. "I begin to recognise you again.
I have seen you only from a distance so far, but I seem to know you very
well. You are `Nan,' you say, and you are what--number three, I
suppose? The young lady who went away the other day is the elder
sister, and after her comes the fair one with the golden locks."

"Lilias! Yes; she is the beauty of the family; I come next, and then
Elsie, the little one, with big, dark eyes. We call her `Mrs
Gummidge,' because she is melancholy, and feels things `more than
others.' Then comes Agatha; you know Agatha! the great big girl with
the huge feet and the rosy cheeks; and Christabel, the youngest--"

"Oh yes, I know Christabel!" said Mr Vanburgh, smiling, "and her friend
who comes to lessons every day: the brown-legged stork, with the red cap
and the curly locks. I like that child. She looks honest and
straightforward! Who is she?"

"Why, that's Kitty!" replied Nan, in a voice of surprised reproof, for
surely every one in Waybourne must know an important personage like
Kitty! "Her name is really Gwendoline Maitland, but everybody calls her
Kitty; and she was longing to know you, and made her mother come to call
in her new spring clothes, with a promise to bring in her name at every
turn of the conversation; and then, after all, you would not receive
her!"

"That was very sad! I am afraid I must have appeared churlish; but, as
a matter of fact, I came down to Waybourne to avoid old friends, rather
than make new ones. I am too ill to be sociable. It is a trial to me,
nowadays, to meet strangers."

"And yet--"

"And yet I wished to see you! That seems rather a contradiction, does
it not? But I have always been fond of young people, and I seemed to
have made your acquaintance in spite of myself. Perhaps you are hardly
aware how plainly one can see into your sitting-room from here."

Nan smiled and bent forward t