386 THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY. mystifying to see that he dropped a smile of chastened devotion. Pansy replied as usual, with a little air of conscientious aspira- tion ; he had to bend toward her a good deal in conversation, and her eyes, as usual, wandered up and down his robust person, as if he had offered it to her for exhibition. She always seemed a little frightened ; yet her fright was not of the painful character that suggests dislike ; on the contrary, she looked as if she knew that he knew that she liked him. Isabel left them together a little, and wandered toward a friend whom she saw near, and with whom she talked till the music of the following dance began, for which she knew that Pansy was also engftged. The young girl joined her presently, with a little fluttered look, and Isabel, who scrupulously took Osmond's view of his daughter's complete dependence, consigned her, as a precious and momentary loan, to her appointed partner. About all this matter she had her own imaginations, her own reserves; there were moments when Pansy's extreme adhesiveness made each of them, to her sense, look foolish. But Osmond had given her a sort of tableau of her position as his daughter's duenna, which consisted of gracious alternation of concession and contraction ; and there were directions of his which she liked to think that she obeyed to the letter. Perhaps, as regards some of them, it was because her doing so appeared to reduce them to the absurd. After Pansy had been led away, Isabel found Lord Warburton drawing near her again. She rested her eyes on him, steadily ; she wished she could sound his thoughts. But he had no appearance of confusion. " She has promised to dance with me laterf" he said. " I am glad of that. I suppose you have engaged her for tlu> cotillion." At this he looked a little awkward. " No, I didn't ask her for that. It's t a quadrille." " Ah, you are not clever ! " said Isabel, almost angrily. " I told her to keep the cotillion, in case you should ask for iU" "Poor little maid, fancy that!" And Lord Warburton l.aughed frankly. " Of course I will if you like." " If I like 1 Oh, if you dance with her only because I like it!" " I am afraid I bore her. She seems to have a lot of young fellows on her book." Isabel dropped her eyes, reflecting rapidly ; Lord Warburton stood there looking at her and she felt his eyes on her face. She felt much inclined to ask him to remove them. She did not do
