Mrs. Ferrers looked complacently down at her tea-gown of soft creamy Indian silk, copiously trimmed with softer Breton lace, and felt that at least she was a very well-dressed vegetable. Knots of palest blue satin nestled here and there among the lace; a cluster of hot-house roses—large velvety yellow roses—reposed on Mrs. Ferrers’s shoulder, and agreeably contrasted with her dark, smoothly-banded hair. She prided herself on the classic form of her small head, and the classic simplicity of her coiffure. ‘I think we all belong, more or less, to the vegetable tribe about here,’ said Mr. Turchill. ‘There is something sleepy in the very air of our pastoral valleys. I sometimes long to get away to the stone-wall country yonder, on the Cotswolds, to breathe a freer, more wakeful air.’ ‘I can’t say that I languish for the Cotswolds,’ replied Mrs. Ferrers, ‘but I should very much like a fortnight in Mayfair. Do you know if your father and Madoline are going to London this season, Daphne?’ ‘I think not. Papa fancies himself not quite well enough for the fatigue of London, and Lina does not care about going.’ It had been Sir Vernon’s habit to take a furnished house at the West End for part of May and June, in order to see all the picture-galleries, and hear all the operas that were worth being heard, and to do a little visiting among his very select circle of acquaintance. He was not a man who made new acquaintances if he could help it, or who went to people because they lived in big houses and gave big dinners. He was exclusive to a fault, detested crowds, and had a rooted conviction that every new man was a swindler, who was destined to end his career in ignominious bankruptcy. It had gone hard with him to consent to his daughter’s engagement with a man who on the father’s side was a parvenu; but he had consoled himself as best he might with the idea of Lady Geraldine’s blue blood, and Mr. Goring’s very substantial fortune. ‘And so you are no longer a school-girl, Daphne, and have come home for good,’ said Mrs. Ferrers, dropping her elegant society manner and putting on a sententious air, which Daphne knew too well. ‘I hope you are going to try to improve yourself—for what girls learn at school is a mere smattering—and that you are aware how much room there is for improvement—in your carriage, for instance.’ ‘I haven’t any carriage, aunt, but papa is going to let me keep a boat,’ said Daphne, who had been absently watching the little yellow butterflies skimming above the flame-coloured tulips. ‘My dear, I am talking of your deportment. You are sitting most awkwardly at this moment, one shoulder at least three inches higher than the other.’ ‘Don’t worry about it, aunt,’ said Daphne indifferently; ‘perhaps it’s a natural deformity.’