Cecilia listened, and said it was all “Vastly well! excellent! But I had nothing in the world to say of Miss Clarendon, but that she was too good--too sincere for the world we live in. For instance, at Paris, one day a charming Frenchwoman was telling some anecdote of the day in the most amusing manner. Esther Clarendon all the while stood by, grave and black as night, and at last turning upon our charmer at the end of the story, pronounced, ‘There is not one word of truth in all you have been saying!’ Conceive it, in full salon! The French were in such amazement. ‘Inconceivable!’ as they might well say to me, as she walked off with her tragedy-queen air; _‘Inconcevable--mais, vraiment inconcevable;’_ and _‘Bien Anglaise,’_ they would have added, no doubt, if I had not been by.” “But there must surely have been some particular reason,” said Helen. “None in the world, only the story was not true, I believe. And then another time, when she was with her cousin, the Duchess of Lisle, at Lisle-Royal, and was to have gone out the next season in London with the Duchess, she came down one morning, just before they were to set off for town, and declared that she had heard such a quantity of scandal since she had been there, and such shocking things of London society, that she had resolved not to go out with the Duchess, and not to go to town at all? So absurd--so prudish!” Helen felt some sympathy in this, and was going to have said so, but Cecilia went on with-- “And then to expect that Granville Beauclerc--should--” Here Cecilia paused, and Helen felt curious, and ashamed of her curiosity; she turned away, to raise the branches of some shrub, which were drooping from the weight of their flowers. “I know something _has_ been thought of,” said Cecilia. “A match has been in contemplation--do you comprehend me, Helen?” “You mean that Mr. Beauclerc is to marry Miss Clarendon,” said Helen, compelled to speak. “I only say it has been thought of,” replied Lady Cecilia; “that is, as every thing in this way is thought of about every couple not within the prohibited degrees, one’s grandmother inclusive. And the plainer the woman, the more sure she is to contemplate such things for herself, lest no one else should think of them for her. But, my dear Helen, if you mean to ask--” “Oh, I don’t mean to ask any thing,” cried Helen. “But, whether you ask or not, I must tell you that the general is too proud to own, even to himself, that he could; ever think of any man for his sister who had not first proposed for her.” There was a pause for some minutes.