Daisy, the younger girl, huddled into a sofa-corner, with a book which absorbed all her attention, was round-faced and plump, with a clever full brow and innocent lips. Though close upon sixteen, she was childish still, alike in manner and in the almost infantile simplicity of her thick white frock. Anice, nearly three years older, wore a white dress likewise, but of thinner texture and more elaborate make, and while undoubtedly a pretty girl, with delicate features and changeful colouring, her face not only lacked force but had a look of marked self-occupation, sufficient to spoil the fairest outline. Daisy's contented brown eyes contained better promise for the future; and people were apt to grow early tired of Anice. Fulvia Rolfe presented a contrast to the sisters. Some two years the senior of Anice, she was not so tall as the latter, nor so stout as Daisy; and the first idea commonly received about her was of a sturdy vigour of body and mind. Though by no means beautiful, since her face was rather flat, with a retrousse nose, and eyes which had an odd eastern slant in the manner of their setting, she yet possessed a certain power of attraction. Those same light grey eyes were full of sparkle; the lips were expressive; the abundant red-brown hair was skilfully arranged; the figure, though not slight, was particularly good; and the hands, if neither small nor especially white, were well formed and soft. "Which shade?" Anice repeated vacantly. "I don't know. One of these four, I suppose." "If a tablecloth is worth making at all, it is worth making not hideous. Let me see the greens. Impossible to choose in this light. You will have to leave it till to-morrow. Where is the madre all this time?" For Fulvia Rolfe, left early an orphan, and unable to recollect her own parents, had fallen into a mode of calling Mrs. and Mr. Browning by the titles of "madre" and "padre." The mode was copied, not seldom, by their own children. "She went to the study. Padre wanted her, I believe. It is one of his bad days, and I suppose he couldn't stand all of us." Fulvia's lips took a naughty set. "And so, because he is a little bad, we are all to be very sad." "Father isn't well." Anice looked reproachful. "He's not bound to be utterly doleful too, my dear." "Madre said he was so depressed." "Of course. Exactly what I mean. I never can quite see why one is to act as a wet blanket to all one's friends merely because one feels poorly or out of spirits. I'm not talking about padre in particular. The sort of thing is common enough. But I wonder when one is to exercise self-control if not when it goes against the grain. There's no merit in cheerfulness when one feels lively." "I don't know what you mean, but you ought not to speak so of padre."