"She is fairly beautiful. She has the witching ways of those golden-haired women, and all their flattering submissions. She can drop her blue eyes, and then lift them with a flash that would trouble any man's heart that had love or life left in it. And see how wisely and warily she dresses herself--the long, black, satin gown, with its white crape collar and cuffs, and the black and white satin ribbons so fresh and uncreased!" "And the wave and curl of her lovely hair, under the small white lace bonnet! I thought, Aunt, she----" "She ought not to have worn a white bonnet. It is too soon after her husband's death to wear a bit of white lace and a few white flowers on her head. She should have worn her widow's bonnet for two years, and it is wanting half a year at least of that term. But, this or that, she is a butterfly of beauty and vanity, and I would not be astonished if she fell in love with your father. To most women he would be an extraordinarily attractive man." "O Aunt Jessy, what an idea! That would be the most unlikely of things." "For that very reason it is likely." "Father never notices women except in a religious way--when they are in trouble, or want his advice about their souls." "You can no more judge your father by his outside than you can judge a cocoanut. He has a volcanic soul--ordinarily the fire is low and quiet, but if it should become active it would be a dangerous thing to meddle with." "Father may have an austere face, but he has a tender mouth; and, O Aunt, I have seen love leap into his shadowy eyes when I have met him at the door, or drawn my chair close to his side in the evening." "Your father is a good man. He has a genius for divine things--but women are not reckoned in that class." "And I think Lord Cramer is a good man, though his genius may be for military things. He had the light of battle on his face this afternoon when he told us of that fight with the Afghans; and how sad was his expression when he described the burying of his company's colonel after it--the open grave in a cleft of hills dark with pines, the solemn dead march, the noble words spoken as they left their leader forever, and turned back to camp to the tender, homely strains of _Annie Laurie_. Oh, I could see and hear all. I have felt ever since as if I had been present." "He appears to be a fine young fellow, though we must remember that men judge men better than women can; and it may be possible your father's opinion of Lord Richard Cramer has at least some truth in it." "I do not believe it has. I think, also, that Lord Cramer is the handsomest man I ever saw. Just compare him with Allan Reid." "Why are you speaking of Allan Reid?" "Because Father thinks I will marry the creature." "Will you do as your father wishes?"