“Will you go? I want to shut the door…. Ginevra, people may tell you you are very handsome in that ball-attire; but, in _my_ eyes, you will never look so pretty as you did in the gingham gown and plain straw bonnet you wore when I first saw you.” “Other people have not your puritanical tastes,” was her angry reply. “And, besides, I see no right you have to sermonize me.” “Certainly! I have little right; and you, perhaps, have still less to come flourishing and fluttering into my chamber—a mere jay in borrowed plumes. I have not the least respect for your feathers, Miss Fanshawe; and especially the peacock’s eyes you call a _parure_: very pretty things, if you had bought them with money which was your own, and which you could well spare, but not at all pretty under present circumstances.” “On est là pour Mademoiselle Fanshawe!” was announced by the portress, and away she tripped. This semi-mystery of the _parure_ was not solved till two or three days afterwards, when she came to make a voluntary confession. “You need not be sulky with me,” she began, “in the idea that I am running somebody, papa or M. de Bassompierre, deeply into debt. I assure you nothing remains unpaid for, but the few dresses I have lately had: all the rest is settled.” “There,” I thought, “lies the mystery; considering that they were not given you by Mrs. Cholmondeley, and that your own means are limited to a few shillings, of which I know you to be excessively careful.” “Ecoutez!” she went on, drawing near and speaking in her most confidential and coaxing tone; for my “sulkiness” was inconvenient to her: she liked me to be in a talking and listening mood, even if I only talked to chide and listened to rail. “Ecoutez, chère grogneuse! I will tell you all how and about it; and you will then see, not only how right the whole thing is, but how cleverly managed. In the first place, I _must_ go out. Papa himself said that he wished me to see something of the world; he particularly remarked to Mrs. Cholmondeley, that, though I was a sweet creature enough, I had rather a bread-and-butter-eating, school-girl air; of which it was his special desire that I should get rid, by an introduction to society here, before I make my regular début in England. Well, then, if I go out, I _must_ dress. Mrs. Cholmondeley is turned shabby, and will give nothing more; it would be too hard upon uncle to make him pay for _all_ the things I need: _that_ you can’t deny—_that_ agrees with your own preachments. Well, but SOMEBODY who heard me (quite by chance, I assure you) complaining to Mrs. Cholmondeley of my distressed circumstances, and what straits I was put to for an ornament or two—_somebody_, far from grudging one a present, was quite delighted at the idea of being permitted to offer some trifle. You should have seen what a _blanc-bec_ he looked when he first spoke of it: how he hesitated and blushed, and positively trembled from fear of a repulse.”