good-night and deliberately putting her lips to it.

Was she a girl whose notion of rectifying one wrong thing done, was to do
another? Nataly could merely observe. A voice pertaining to no one
present, said in her ear:--Mothers have publicly slapped their daughter's
faces for less than that!--It was the voice of her incapacity to cope
with the girl. She watched Nesta's passage from the room, somewhat
affected by the simple bearing for which she was reproaching her.

'And our poor darling has not seen a mountain this year!' Victor
exclaimed, to have mentionable grounds for pitying his girl. 'I promised
Fredi she should never count a year without Highlands or Alps. You
remember, mama?--down in the West Highlands. Fancy the dear bit of
bundle, Dartrey!--we had laid her in her bed; she was about seven or
eight; and there she lay wide awake. "What 's Fredi thinking of?"--
"I'm thinking of the tops of the mountains at night, dada."--She could
climb them now; she has the legs.'

Nataly said: 'You have some report to make. You dined with those
people?'

'The Marsetts: yes:--well-suited couple enough. It's to happen before
Winter ends--at once; before Christmas; positively before next Spring.
Fredi's doing! He has to manage, arrange.--She's a good-looking woman,
good height, well-rounded; well-behaved, too: she won't make a bad Lady
Marsett. Every time that woman spoke of our girl, the tears jumped to
her eyelids.'

'Come to me before you go to bed,' Nataly said, rising, her voice
foundering; 'Good-night, Dartrey.'