The Charm School
been furnished for her by her parents on the occasion of her marriage in the year 1891. It was so long for its width that it had the effect of being a brocaded tunnel; the walls were hung with pale pink, on which electric lights and French water-colors alternated; the chairs were, of course, copies of Louis XV, and the mantelpiece was as crowded as a lawn-party with Dresden figures. No books were visible, except a copy of the Girlhood of Shakespeare's Heroines, bound in black-and-gold, and three immense volumes of steel-engravings from the National Gallery. The house had a library—up-stairs in what had before Mr. Rolles's death been her bedroom—but the drawing-room was no place for reading; it was the place for just such terrible interviews as the one now taking place there.
The young man was of the most extraordinary beauty—not only of face, but of figure, for he was as lithe and active as a cat, but his conspicuous feature was his eyes—eyes of the clearest sky blue, in surprising contrast to his bronzed skin and black hair and lashes. He was clean-shaven, so that a mouth of sensitive curves could be seen, and a chin that contradicted those curves by its firm aggression.
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