"Where are your eyes, Pynsent?" asked Mr. Vyvyan. "I detected the lady the moment you addressed her." "'Love in her eyes for ever plays,'" sang Mr. Wycherly. "'It makes her rosy lips his care.'" "'And walks the mazes of her hair,'" added Mr. Vyvyan. Tom Pynsent gazed on each speaker in silent amazement: no pencil could pourtray the workings of his countenance. "Who would sorrow for the cold-hearted, when a handsome girl worships the ground one treads upon?" cried Mr. John Tyndal. "Not I for one." "I wish she would give _me_ one of those dovelike glances she bestows upon the dull-headed Pynsent," sighed Mr. Henry Tyndal. "By Jove, gentlemen, I don't consider myself dull!" at last Tom Pynsent burst forth. "I know many ladies who would like to live at Hatton, though they care little enough about its master; but I deny your present statement. Who is the lady you allude to?" "Go and ask Miss Wetheral to dance, Pynsent, and she will assist you in solving our riddle," said Mr. Wycherly, laughing. "Good heavens! if a woman looked in my eyes, as I saw a lady consulting yours just now, Pynsent, I should feel myself called upon to fall desperately in love," observed his friend Vyvyan. "God bless my soul! do you mean that _Miss_ Wetheral likes me?" Tom Pynsent uttered the question with an agitated and hurried tone of voice, which caused a general laugh among his auditors, but Mr. Wycherly spoke seriously and looked in earnest. "You were in love with her sister, Pynsent, and had no time to observe other women. Every one else could read in the expression of Miss Wetheral's manner and countenance her decided liking for you." "God bless my soul!" again ejaculated Tom Pynsent, "I never saw her look me in the face in my life!" "My dear fellow, you are as green as a girl in her sixteenth year. Do you fancy a woman stares at you by way of shewing her true love? Her downcast looks and melancholy appearance betray her. She only brightens up when you address her, and to all other men she is cold as an iceberg. Such are Miss Wetheral's symptoms, and such are all delicate-minded women's manners, when they are not hunting down a fortune. I know the sex, Pynsent." "Such a woman is worth a thousand scornful dames," remarked old Mr. Tyndal. "Pynsent looks petrified!" exclaimed young Spottiswoode. "Pynsent at fault, by the Lord Harry!" laughed his friend Vyvyan. "Cold scent, Pynsent, after your late run," cried Spottiswoode, entertained beyond measure at poor Tom's _égaré_ looks. The group of gentlemen rallied unmercifully their bewildered companion upon his dull reception of a piece of intelligence which would have raised any other man from the dead. Tom Pynsent's temper stood all jibes with unwearied patience, and when his mind had somewhat recovered the standard of its usual tone, he rebutted their attacks in his own loud tone of voice.