is that Mrs Wititterly gave audience in the drawing-room, where was
everything proper and necessary, including curtains and furniture
coverings of a roseate hue, to shed a delicate bloom on Mrs Wititterly's
complexion, and a little dog to snap at strangers' legs for Mrs
Wititterly's amusement, and the afore-mentioned page, to hand chocolate
for Mrs Wititterly's refreshment.

The lady had an air of sweet insipidity, and a face of engaging
paleness; there was a faded look about her, and about the furniture, and
about the house. She was reclining on a sofa in such a very unstudied
attitude, that she might have been taken for an actress all ready for
the first scene in a ballet, and only waiting for the drop curtain to go
up.

'Place chairs.'

The page placed them.

'Leave the room, Alphonse.'

The page left it; but if ever an Alphonse carried plain Bill in his face
and figure, that page was the boy.

'I have ventured to call, ma'am,' said Kate, after a few seconds of
awkward silence, 'from having seen your advertisement.'

'Yes,' replied Mrs Wititterly, 'one of my people put it in the
paper--Yes.'

'I thought, perhaps,' said Kate, modestly, 'that if you had not