hour, they are open to take animation from their visitors. Aminta was
pleasantly surprised next day by the receipt of a note from Mrs. Lawrence
Finchley, begging to be invited to lunch if she came, as she had a
purpose in the wish to meet my lord.




[NOTE: The remainder of 'Lord Ormont and His Aminta' is taken from an
older edition which uses single rather than double quotation marks.
D.W.]




CHAPTER VIII

MRS. LAWRENCE FINCHLEY

My lord had one of his wilful likings for Isabella Lawrence Finchley,
and he consented to the torture of an hour of Mrs. Nargett Pagnell in the
middle of the day, just to taste the favourite he welcomed at home as he
championed her abroad. The reasons were numerous and intimate why she
pleased him. He liked the woman, enjoyed the cause for battle that she
gave. Weyburn, on coming to the luncheon table, beheld a lady with the
head of a comely boy, the manner, softened in delicate feminine, of a
capital comrade. Her air of candour was her nature in her face; and it
carried a guileless roguery, a placid daring, a supersensual naughtiness,
a simplicity of repose amid the smoky reputation she created, that led
one to think the vapour calumnious or the creature privileged. That