She looked at her questioner with a serene smile, and Mrs. Hunstanton, for her part, could only gasp and gaze at her with a consternation beyond words. But she would not give up even for this distinct repulse. “Perhaps you are right,” she said, rallying her forces; “but--you won’t mind my speaking frankly? Nobody else has thought so, Mrs. Norton. He has seemed to entertain very different thoughts. I, for my part, have been quite deceived. I hope you will forgive me for saying so, but I have been watching Mr. Pandolfini very much of late, and I never suspected it was Sophy that was in his mind.” Mrs. Norton smiled with gentle superiority. “I don’t know what you expect me to say, Mrs. Hunstanton. I have seen it, as I tell you, all along; and he must know best himself, one would suppose. When a gentleman proposes to a young lady, people do not usually set up their ideas of what they expected. He is the one that must know best.” “I know--I know:” said Mrs. Hunstanton, driven to despair, and to a humility not at all in her way. What was there to answer to such a reasonable statement? She could not ask directly whether it was her husband who had done it all, and if it was only his word they had for Pandolfini’s sentiments. She was thoroughly wretched, and thoroughly subdued. “Have you seen him this evening?” she asked, faltering. That was the nearest approach she could make to the question she was longing to ask. “Oh yes,” said Mrs. Norton, with smiling confidence. “He was with us just before we came here, and he was so sorry not to come with us. Knowing as he does our obligations to Diana, and feeling all her kindness, it quite grieved him not to come.” “To Diana!” Mrs. Hunstanton repeated the words mechanically, catching them up without any clear comprehension of what the other said. Then she said, somewhat incoherently, “But you must have been startled, at least surprised, yourself--it must have taken you by surprise.” “On the contrary,” said Mrs. Norton, meeting with a serene countenance the eyes full of care and trouble which her companion turned upon her, “I have already told you I had expected it all along.” The inquirer withdrew baffled, with trembling lips and a clouded brow, leaving the little woman victorious. Mrs. Hunstanton was not used to such utter discomfiture, and bore it badly. She withdrew into a corner near the door. Perhaps Pandolfini would come after all, and she might waylay him, though she did not see what end would be served by so doing; for how could she ask him if it was true that it was Sophy and no other who was his choice? But Pandolfini did not come to answer any of these questions. He had never stayed away before.