“She must be set to some good work,” thought Mrs. Poynsett; “Julius might let her go to his old women.  She might get on with them better than with the old women here.  And there’s Cecil’s working affair, it would be just the thing to give her an object.  I think I can get through this evening.  I’ve made Susan bring my desk, with all Miles’s letters from his first voyage.  Shall I suppress the ball?”

Therewith Cecil made her entrance, in glossy white satin and deep lace, beautiful to behold, set off with rainbow glistening opals.  She made a quiet complacent show of herself, as one not vain of fine clothes, but used to an affectionate family appreciation of her best attire; and it was the most friendly childlike bit of intimacy that had yet been attained between her and Mrs. Poynsett.

And when she sat down to wait for the others, Mrs. Poynsett ventured on telling her the prescription and her own perplexity, hoping for a voluntary offer to employ Anne at Willansborough; but Cecil only pitied her for having ‘no resources’; and when Mrs. Poynsett ventured to suggest finding a niche for her in the work-room, the answer was—­“Our days are all disposed of.”

“You have two, I think?”

“True; but it would never do for me to give up one of my times.  If I seemed to slacken, every one else would.”

“What will you do when the Session begins?”

“I shall make some arrangement.  I do not think Anne could ever take my place; she would have no authority.”

Anne herself here entered, took her knitting, and sat down, apparently unaware of the little pluming gesture by which Cecil unconsciously demanded attention to her bridal satin.  One white-gloved gentleman after another dropped in, but none presumed on a remark; Jenkins announced the carriages; but Rosamond had not appeared, and after an excursion up-stairs, Julius returned, declaring that the first carriage must not wait for her, they would come afterwards in the van, for there was something amiss in the dress, she had not had it on since the wedding.

“And she came in so late,” said Cecil.

“That was my fault,” he said.  “We came through the village to leave a message at the doctor’s;” and he then insisted that the other pair should set off, taking Frank and Charlie, and prevent dinner from being kept waiting; at which the boys made faces, and declared that it was a dodge of his to join Jenny’s party in the schoolroom, instead of the solemn dinner; but they were obliged to submit; and it was not till twenty minutes later, that in glided something white, with blue cashmere and swan’s-down over it, moving, as usual, with languid grace.

“Poor Julius!” smiled Rosamond with her dawdling dignity.  “Every single thing turned out a misfit!  As it is, there’s a monstrous hole in my glove, which demands the benevolent fiction of my having torn it by the way.  There, one second for the effect!—­Good-bye, dear Mrs. Poynsett;—­good-bye, Anne.  Come, you monument of patience and resignation!”