‘You may suppose that I think him so,’ answered Madoline, going on with the fashioning of a water-lily on a ground of soft gray cloth. ‘I can hardly trust myself to praise him, for fear I should say too much.’ ‘How is it that I have seen no photograph of him? I expected to see half-a-dozen portraits of him in this room alone; but I suppose you have an album crammed with his photos somewhere under lock and key.’ ‘He has not been photographed since he was a school-boy. He detests photography; and though he has often promised me that he would sacrifice his own feelings so far as to be photographed, he has never kept his word.’ ‘That is very bad of him,’ said Daphne. ‘I am bursting with curiosity about his looks. But—perhaps,’ she faltered, with a deprecating air, ‘the poor thing is rather plain, and that is why he does not care to be photographed.’ ‘No,’ replied Madoline, with her gentle smile; ‘I do not think his worst enemy could call him plain—not that I should love him less if he were the plainest of mankind.’ ‘Yes, you would,’ exclaimed Daphne, with conviction. ‘It is all very well to talk about loving a man for his mind, or his heart, and all that kind of thing. You wouldn’t love a man with a potato-nose or a pimply complexion, if he were morally the most perfect creature in the universe. I am very glad my future brother is handsome.’ ‘That is a matter of opinion—I don’t know your idea of a handsome man.’ ‘Let me see,’ paid Daphne, clasping her bands above her head, in a charmingly listless attitude, and giving herself up to thought. ‘My idea of good looks in a man? The subject requires deliberation. What do you say to a pale complexion, inclining to sallowness; dreamy eyes, under dark straight brows; forehead low, yet broad enough to give room for plenty of brains; mouth grave, and even mournful in expression, except when he smiles—the whole face must light up like a god’s when he smiles; hair darkest brown, short, straight, silky?’ ‘One would think you had seen Mr. Goring, and were describing him,’ said Madoline. ‘What, Lina, is he like that?’ ‘It is so difficult to realise a description, but really yours might do for Gerald. Yet, I daresay, the image in your mind is totally different from that in mine.’ ‘No doubt,’ answered Daphne, and then, with a half-breathed sigh, she quoted her favourite Tennyson. ‘No two dreams are alike.’ ‘You will be able to judge for yourself before long,’ said Madoline; ‘Gerald is coming home in the autumn.’ ‘The autumn!’ cried Daphne. ‘That is an age to wait. And then, I suppose, you are to be married immediately?’ ‘Not till next spring, That is my father’s wish. You see, I don’t come of age till I’m twenty-five, and there are settlements and technical difficulties. Papa thought it best for us to wait, and I did not wish to oppose him.’ ‘I believe it is all my father’s selfishness. He can’t bear to lose you.’