Page:What Maisie Knew (Chicago & New York, Herbert S. Stone & Co., 1897).djvu/203

Rh Claude's being "tackled." The Captain was n't a bit like him; for it was an odd part of the pleasantness of mamma's friend that it resided in a manner in this friend's being ugly. An odder part still was that it presently made our young lady, to classify him further, say to herself that of all people in the world he reminded her most insidiously of Mrs. Wix. He had neither straighteners nor a diadem nor, at least in the same place as the other, a button; he was sunburnt and deep-voiced and smelt of cigars; yet he marvellously had more in common with her old governess than with her young stepfather. What he had to say to her that was good for her to hear was that her poor mother, did n't she know? was the best friend he had ever had in all his life. And he added: "She has told me ever so much about you. I 'm awfully glad to know you."

She had never, she thought, been so addressed as a young lady; not even by Sir Claude the day so long ago that she found him with Mrs. Beale. It struck her as the way that, at balls, by delightful partners, young ladies must be spoken to in the intervals of dances; and she tried to think of something that would meet it at the same