Page:The Awkward Age (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1899).djvu/30

THE AWKWARD AGE Mr. Longdon continued to inspect her more favored friend; which led him after a moment to bring out: "She ought to be, you know. Her grandmother was."

"Oh, and her mother," Vanderbank threw in. "Don't you think Mrs. Brookenham lovely?"

Mr. Longdon kept him waiting a little. "Not so lovely as Lady Julia. Lady Julia had—" He faltered; then, as if there were too much to say, disposed of the question. "Lady Julia had everything."

Vanderbank gathered from the sound of the words an impression that determined him more and more to diplomacy. "But isn't that just what Mrs. Brookenham has?"

This time the old man was prompt. "Yes, she's very brilliant, but it's a totally different thing." He laid little Aggie down and moved away as if without a purpose; but Vanderbank presently perceived his purpose to be another glance at the other young lady. As if accidentally and absently, he bent again over the portrait of Nanda. "Lady Julia was exquisite, and this child's exactly like her."

Vanderbank, more and more conscious of something working in him, was more and more interested. "If Nanda's so like her, was she so exquisite?" he hazarded.

"Oh yes; every one was agreed about that." Mr. Longdon kept his eyes on the face, trying a little, Vanderbank even thought, to conceal his own. "She was one of the greatest beauties of her day."

"Then is Nanda so like her?" Vanderbank persisted, amused at his friend's transparency.

"Extraordinarily. Her mother told me all about her."

"Told you she's as beautiful as her grandmother?"

Mr. Longdon turned it over. "Well, that she has just Lady Julia's expression. She absolutely has it—I see it here." He was delightfully positive. "She's much more like the dead than like the living." 20