Yet at the same time, mixed in therewith, a curious strain of womanish, nay childish, weakness, appealingness.

Altogether, a great lady, and a personality--yet something else too--something ill-assured, timid, incongruous--hard to be defined.
"I believe you have not been at Mellor long ?" the new-comer asked, in a deep contralto voice which she dragged a little.
"About seven weeks.

My father and mother have been there since May." "You must of course think it a very interesting old place ?" "Of course I do; I love it," said Marcella, disconcerted by the odd habit Lady Winterbourne had of fixing her eyes upon a person, and then, as it were, forgetting what she had done with them.
"Oh, I haven't been there, Agneta," said the new-comer, turning after a pause to Miss Raeburn, "since that summer--_you_ remember that party when the Palmerstons came over--so long ago--twenty years!" Marcella sat stiffly upright.

Lady Winterbourne grew a little nervous and flurried.
"I don't think I ever saw your mother, Miss Boyce--I was much away from home about then.

Oh, yes, I did once--" The speaker stopped, a sudden red suffusing her pale cheeks.