The Argosy — page 115: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

98 The House of Halliwell. “No,” she replied. ‘‘ Tell papa it will be scarcely worth while, for I must begin to dress in an hour. And I am busy.” “You can go and tell him yourself, Madam Georgy. There’s Wells with my pointer, and I want to catch him.” ‘““'Where 1s papa?” ‘Oh, I don’t know ; in the library, or somewhere.” He had vaulted down stairs as he spoke, and Hester saw him tearing after the gamekeeper. Lady Georgina left the room, Hester supposed to find the Earl. When she returned, she halted before a mirror that was let into the panel between the windows, and turned some of her flowing curls xound her finger. Her sylph-hke form, her fair neck and arms—for it was not the custom then for young ladies to have these covered, even.in morning dress—her bright hair, her patrician features, their damask bloom, and the flash of conscious triumph lighting her eye! Very conscious of her fascinations was the Lady Georgina Seaford. She caught Hester’s earnest gaze of admiration, and turned sharply round. ‘What are you thinking of, Miss Halliwell ? ” The question startled Hester. She supposed, in her timid ignorance, that she must confess the truth, when a noble lady asked it. So she stammered out her thoughts—that until she saw the Lady Georgina, she had not imagined it possible for anyone to be so lovely. ‘You must be given to flattery, in this part of the world,” was the young lady’s answer, with a laugh and blush of conscious vanity. “* Another, here, has avowed the same to me, and I advised Az not to come to the castle too often, if there were a danger that I should turn his head.” Who was that other? A painful conviction shot over Hester that at was Mr. Archer. Lady Georgina seemed quite a creature of impulse, indulged and wilful. Before she had sat twenty minutes, she pushed the drawings together, said it was stupid, and they would go on with it another day. So the little girl came back again. At five o’clock Hester was putting on her bonnet to leave, when Lady Georgina re-entered the room, in full dress. They were going out to dinner. An India muslin frock, with blue floss trimming, a blue band round her slender waist, with a pearl buckle, pearl side- combs in her hair, a pearl necklace, and long white kid gloves. It was the mode of dress then—and a very pretty one. ‘“ Nelly,” she said to her sister, ‘I want you to give a message to the boys.” And she bent down and whispered the child. “William or Harry?” asked the little girl aloud. “Oh, Harry,” replied Lady Georgina. ‘William would not trouble himself to remember.” She left the room again. What the purport of her whisper was, of course Hester did not know. Mademoiselle Berri, the Swiss governess, was in the room then, writing, and when Lady Ellen ran Gomilcbooks.co ml |