aps, for
the spaniel.

Anyway, it was the only time I ever really liked a spaniel.

Well, I needn't describe the others. At any rate, if you've ever seen
the "Keepsake" kind of young women, you won't have forgotten them. You
will cherish a spite, especially if you have had to stay in one room
and choose between looking at them and flattening your nose against the
window-panes, down which the water is running in big blobs, during a
week of wet holiday weather.

Constantia was a "Keepsake" girl.

I suppose it must be, as it is with snakes. Some like them and some
not. I don't. But I will never deny (not being, like Elsie, a girl)
that Constantia was good looking. If (and the Lord have mercy on your
soul!) you really liked that sort of thing, Constantia was just the
sort of thing you would like.

CHAPTER XIV

BROWN PAINT--VARNISHED!

We had a merry afternoon and laughed--eh, how we laughed! I heard all
about the girls, how they had just been at school, and how Constantia
had just come home, full up of all the perfections, and deportment, and
the 'ologies, and how many men wanted to marry her--were dying to, in
fact! That might be all right. It was Harriet who told me--though
that does not make it any the more likely to be true (I am sorry to
say). For I can see that that young woman was trying to take me in all
the time.

"But for the parson, we would have a dance!" whispered Harriet; "but as
he will sit there and tell Stancy about her 'azure' eyes till all's
blue, you and I can go for a walk instead--shall we?"

I didn't want to, you may imagine. The difficulty was how to say No.
Indeed, Harriet never asked me. She had put on a smart little summer
hat, and we were out on the moor quicker than I can write it.

"Mind you," she said, laying her hand confidingly (as I then thought)
on my arm, "don't you ever dare to tell Stancy that her eyes are like
to the vault of heaven, or like forget-me-nots wet with dew, or like
turquoises, or the very colour of her sky-blue silk scarf. For, first
of all, it's not true, and it is wrong to tell lies. More than that,
she will tell _me_. And I like--well" (she added this bit softly,
taking a long look at me) "never mind what I like. Perhaps it's as
well that you shouldn't know."

Then she kicked away a pebble with the toe of one tiny boot and
appeared to be embarrassed. I think, now, that she knew she had a
pretty foot.

Anyway I began to be consciou