Eloise continued to meet her mother’s annoyed gaze, her hands fallen in her lap, all the lines of her nut-brown hair, her exquisite face, and pliable, graceful figure so many silent arguments, as they always were, against any one’s harboring annoyance toward her.

“You say he does, mother, and you have assured him of it so often that the poor man doesn’t dare to say otherwise; but really, if you’d let him have the latest Weber and Field hit, I think he would be so grateful.”

“Learn it then!” returned Mrs. Evringham.

Eloise laughed lazily.  “Intrepid little mother!” Then she added, in a different tone, “Don’t you think there is any danger of our being too obliging?  I’m not the only girl in town whose mother wishes her to oblige Dr. Ballard.  May we not overreach ourselves?”

“Eloise!” Mrs. Evringham’s half-affectionate, half-remonstrating grasp fell from her child’s shoulders.  “That remark is in very bad taste.”

The girl shook her head slowly.  “I never can understand why it is any satisfaction to you to pretend.  You find comfort in pretending that Mr. Evringham likes to have us here, likes us to use his carriages, to receive his friends, and all the rest of it.  We’ve been here seven weeks and three days, and that little game of pretending is satisfying you still.  You are like the ostrich with its head in the sand.”

Mrs. Evringham drew her lithe figure up.  “Well, Eloise, I hope there are limits to this.  To call your own mother an—­an ostrich!”

“Don’t speak so loud,” returned the girl, rising and patting her mother’s hand.  “Grandfather has returned from his ride.  I just heard him come in.  It is too near dinner time for a scene.  There is no need of our pretending to each other, is there?  You have always put me off and put me off, but surely you mean to bring this to an end pretty soon?”

“You could bring it to an end at once if you would!” returned Mrs. Evringham, her voice lowered.  “Dr. Ballard has nothing to wait for.  I know all about his circumstances.  There never was such a providence as father’s having a friend like him ready to our hand—­so suitable, so attractive, so rich!”

“Yes,” responded the girl low and equably, “it is just five weeks and two days that you have been throwing me at that man’s head.”

“I have done nothing of the kind, Eloise Evringham.”

“Yes you have,” returned the girl without excitement, “and grandfather sneering at us all the time under his mustache.  He knows that there are other girls and other mothers interested in Dr. Ballard more desirable than we are.  Oh! how easy it is to be more desirable than we are!”

“There isn’t one girl in five hundred so pretty as you,” returned Mrs. Evringham stoutly.

“I wish my prettiness could persuade you into my way of thinking.”

“What do you mean?” The glance of the older woman was keen and suspicious.