"I wish you would tell me what you think of us--how we seem to you," she said to Felix, as he sat before his easel.
"You seem to me the best people in the world," said Felix.
"You say that," Gertrude resumed, "because it saves you the trouble of saying anything else." The young man glanced at her over the top of his canvas.

"What else should I say?
It would certainly be a great deal of trouble to say anything different." "Well," said Gertrude, "you have seen people before that you have liked, have you not ?" "Indeed I have, thank Heaven!" "And they have been very different from us," Gertrude went on.
"That only proves," said Felix, "that there are a thousand different ways of being good company." "Do you think us good company ?" asked Gertrude.
"Company for a king!" Gertrude was silent a moment; and then, "There must be a thousand different ways of being dreary," she said; "and sometimes I think we make use of them all." Felix stood up quickly, holding up his hand.

"If you could only keep that look on your face for half an hour--while I catch it!" he said.

"It is uncommonly handsome." "To look handsome for half an hour--that is a great deal to ask of me," she answered.
"It would be the portrait of a young woman who has taken some vow, some pledge, that she repents of," said Felix, "and who is thinking it over at leisure." "I have taken no vow, no pledge," said Gertrude, very gravely; "I have nothing to repent of." "My dear cousin, that was only a figure of speech.

I am very sure that no one in your excellent family has anything to repent of." "And yet we are always repenting!" Gertrude exclaimed.