Page:Her Roman Lover (Frothingham, 1911).djvu/43

 roundings and able to move with ease among them, to find so many things to talk about, and such responsive ardor in the talking. Finally she was noticed and sent for by old Lady Fitz-Smith, a compliment the import of which she hardly appreciated.

“I want you to sit by me,” said the Dowager, drawing the girl to a sofa beside her. “I can tell you who everybody is, and you must try not to be bored.”

Anne found herself being analyzed by a pair of kind if hardily inquisitive eyes, set in a heavy-featured face that could never have possessed beauty of any kind. The wig of brown hair was very evidently a wig, and an ill-fitting one, while the dress and velvet cape were old-fashioned and badly worn; but there was that weight and dignity to the Dowager’s personality which can only come from a life-long and inherited consciousness of social supremacy.

“I want to talk to you because I am an old woman, and old women like sweet little girls, such as you look to be,” said Lady Fitz-Smith, putting up her lorgnette shamelessly while she examined the slender and sensitive face beside her.

The face was not entirely un-English, with its slightly high cheek-bones and excessive fairness of skin; but the eyes of the American girl did not fall