rrant's were not always what she supposed),
just the _nuance_ (she had also an impression she knew a little French)
of her tone. Olive, after the lapse of weeks, still showed no symptoms
of presenting herself, and Mrs. Tarrant rebuked Verena with some
sternness for not having made her feel that this attention was due to
the mother of her friend. Verena could scarcely say to her she guessed
Miss Chancellor didn't think much of that personage, true as it was that
the girl had discerned this angular fact, which she attributed to
Olive's extraordinary comprehensiveness of view. Verena herself did not
suppose that her mother occupied a very important place in the universe;
and Miss Chancellor never looked at anything smaller than that. Nor was
she free to report (she was certainly now less frank at home, and,
moreover, the suspicion was only just becoming distinct to her) that
Olive would like to detach her from her parents altogether, and was
therefore not interested in appearing to cultivate relations with them.
Mrs. Tarrant, I may mention, had a further motive: she was consumed with
the desire to behold Mrs. Luna. This circumstance may operate as a proof
that the aridity of her life was great, and if it should have that
effect I shall not be able to gainsay it. She had seen all the people
who went to lectures, but there were hours when she desired, for a
change, to see some who didn't go; and Mrs. Luna, from Verena's
description of her, summed up the characteristics of this eccentric
class.

Verena had given great attention to Olive's brilliant sister; she had
told her friend everything now--everything but one little secret,
namely, that if she could have chosen at the beginning she would have
liked to resemble Mrs. Luna. This lady fascinated her, carried off her
imagination to strange lands; she should enjoy so much a long evening
with her alone, when she might ask her ten thousand questions. But she
never saw her alone, never saw her at all but in glimpses. Adeline
flitted in and out, dressed for dinners and concerts, always saying
something worldly to the young woman from Cambridge, and something to
Olive that had a freedom which she herself would probably never arrive
at (a failure of foresight on Verena's part). But Miss Chancellor never
detained her, never gave Verena a chance to see her, never appeared to
imagine that she could have the least interest in such a person; only
took up the subject again after Adeline h