"You are always meeting such charming people," said Garnett with
mild irony; and, reverting to her first remark, he bethought himself
to add: "I hope Miss Hermione is not ill?"
"Ill? She was never ill in her life," exclaimed Mrs. Newell, as
though her daughter had been accused of an indelicacy.
"It was only that you said you had come over on her account."
"So I have. Hermione is to be married."
Mrs. Newell brought out the words impressively, drawing back to
observe their effect on her visitor. It was such that he received
them with a long silent stare, which finally passed into a cry of
wonder. "Married? For heaven's sake, to whom?"
Mrs. Newell continued to regard him with a smile so serene and
victorious that he saw she took his somewhat unseemly astonishment
as a merited tribute to her genius. Presently she extended a
glittering hand and took a sheet of note paper from the blotter.
"You can have that put in to-morrow's _Herald_," she said.
Garnett, receiving the paper, read in Hermione's own finished hand:
"A marriage has been arranged, and will shortly take place, between
the Comte Louis du Trayas, son of the Marquis du Trayas de la Baume,
and Miss Hermione Newell, daughter of Samuel C.
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