They called for Marian early the next morning, and now she received the real greeting, corresponding to her parting, as Mrs. Wortley's second daughter. Then began the inquiries for everything at Fern Torr, animate or inanimate, broken into by Agnes's exclamations of surprise at everything new and wonderful in the streets, a happy, but a most desultory conversation. At last they got into a quiet street where Mr. and Mrs. Wortley went to choose a carpet, and the two girls were left to sit in the carriage. "O Marian!" began Agnes, "so you have not quite lost your old self! I am glad to see how it all is at least, for I have something tangible to pity you for." "I wonder what it is," said Marian, too happy for pity at that moment. "O, my dear! that Mr. Elliot Lyddell!" "He is hardly ever in my way," said Marian. "And his sister! Her dress! What study it must have taken! In the extreme of fashion." "Caroline's dress is not exactly what she would choose herself," said Marian. "That must be only an excuse, Marian; for though you have a well-turned-out look, it is not as if you were in a book of fashions." "I am not Mrs. Lyddell's daughter, and though I do expect a battle or two when I come out, it will not be a matter of obedience with me, as it is with Caroline." "Is it very painful obedience?" said Agnes laughingly; "well, you do deserve credit for not being spoilt among such people." "In the first place, how do you know they are 'such people?' and next, how do you know I am not spoilt?" "You must be the greatest hypocrite in the world, if you are spoilt, to write me such letters, and sit so boldly looking me in the face. And as to their being 'such people,' have not I seen them, have not I heard them, and, above all, has not Mr. Arundel given me their full description?" "But that was three years and a half ago," said Marian. "And have they changed since then?" asked Agnes. "I don't know." "O how glad I am to hear that!" cried Agnes. "Never mind them; but to hear you say 'I don't know' in that old considering tone is proof enough to me that you are my own old Marian, which is all I care for." "I don't--" began Marian; then stopping short and laughing, she added, "I mean I was thinking whether it is really so. Can any person live four years without changing? Especially at our age. What a little girl I was then!" "Yes, to be sure, you have grown into a tall--yes, quite a tall woman, and you have got your black hair into a very pretty broad braid, and you wear a bracelet and carry a parasol, and don't let your veil stream down your back; I don't see much more alteration. Your eyes are as black and your face as white, and altogether you are quite as provoking as ever in never telling one anything that one wishes to know."