"_There_?" my companion gasped.

"A career bigger still than among us, as he considers we haven't half
their eye. He guarantees her _a succes fou_."

She couldn't get over it. "Louisa Brash? In Paris?"

"They do see," I went on, "more than we and they live extraordinarily,
don't you know, in that. But she'll do something here too."

"And what will she do?"

If frankly now I couldn't help giving Mrs. Brash a longer look, so after
it I could as little resist sounding my converser. "You'll see. Only
give her time."

She said nothing during the moment in which she met my eyes; but then:
"Time, it seems to me, is exactly what you and your friend want. If you
haven't talked with her--"

"We haven't seen her? Oh we see bang off--with a click like a steel
spring. It's our trade, it's our life, and we should be donkeys if we
made mistakes. That's the way I saw you yourself, my lady, if I may say
so; that's the way, with a long pin straight through your body, I've got
you. And just so I've got _her_!"

All this, for reasons, had brought my guest to her feet; but her eyes had
while we talked never once followed the direction of mine. "You call her
a Holbein?"