Against this qualification the child instantly protested. “Why is she bad? I don’t think she is bad; I like her very much.” It came over him that he had too hastily shifted to her shoulders the responsibility of his unseemly appearance, and he wished to make up to her for that betrayal. He dimly felt that nothing but that particular accusation could have pushed him to it, for he hated people who were not fresh, who had smutches and streaks. Millicent Henning generally had two or three, which she borrowed from her doll, into whom she was always rubbing her nose and whose dinginess was contagious. It was quite inevitable she should have left her mark under his own nose when she claimed her reward for coming to tell him about the lady who wanted him. Miss Pynsent held the boy against her knee, trying to present him so that Mrs Bowerbank should agree with her about his having the air of race. He was exceedingly diminutive, even for his years, and though his appearance was not positively sickly it seemed written in his attenuated little person that he would never be either tall or strong. His dark blue eyes were separated by a wide interval, which increased the fairness and sweetness of his face, and his abundant curly hair, which grew thick and long, had the golden brownness predestined to elicit exclamations of delight from ladies when they take the inventory of a child. His features were smooth and pretty; his head was set upon a slim little neck; his expression, grave and clear, showed a quick perception as well as a great credulity; and he was altogether, in his innocent smallness, a refined and interesting figure. “Yes, he’s one that would be sure to remember,” said Mrs Bowerbank, mentally contrasting him with the undeveloped members of her own brood, who had never been retentive of anything but the halfpence which they occasionally contrived to filch from her. Her eyes descended to the details of his toilet: the careful mending of his short breeches and his long, coloured stockings, which she was in a position to appreciate, as well as the knot of bright ribbon which the dressmaker had passed into his collar, slightly crumpled by Miss Henning’s embrace. Of course Miss Pynsent had only one to look after, but her visitor was obliged to recognise that she had the highest standard in respect to buttons. “And you _do_ turn him out so it’s a pleasure,” she went on, noting the ingenious patches in the child’s shoes, which, to her mind, were repaired for all the world like those of a little nobleman. “I’m sure you’re very civil,” said Miss Pynsent, in a state of severe exaltation. “There’s never a needle but mine has come near him. That’s exactly what I think: the impression would go so deep.” “Do you want to see me only to look at me?” Hyacinth inquired, with a candour which, though unstudied, had again much of the force of satire.