The girl who sat upright with her hands on her lap was of another type altogether—­of that type of which it is impossible to predicate anything except that it makes itself felt in every company.  Any respectable astrologer would have had no difficulty in assigning her birth to the sign of the Scorpion.  In outward appearance she was not remarkable, though extremely pleasing, and it was a pleasingness that grew upon acquaintance.  Her beauty, such as it was, was based upon a good foundation:  upon regular features, a slightly cleft rounded chin, a quantity of dark coiled hair, and large, steady, serene brown eyes.  Her hands were not small, but beautifully shaped; her figure slender, well made, and always at its ease in any attitude.  In fact, she had an air of repose, strength, and all-round competence; and, contrasted with the other, she resembled a well-bred sheep-dog eyeing an Angora cat.

They were talking now about Laurie Baxter.

“Dear Laurie is so impetuous and sensitive,” murmured his mother, drawing her needle softly through the silk, and then patting her material, “and it is all terribly sad.”

This was undeniable, and Maggie said nothing, though her lips opened as if for speech.  Then she closed them again, and sat watching the twinkling fire of logs upon the hearth.  Then once more Mrs. Baxter took up the tale.

“When I first heard of the poor girl’s death,” she said, “it seemed to me so providential.  It would have been too dreadful if he had married her.  He was away from home, you know, on Thursday, when it happened; but he was back here on Friday, and has been like—­like a madman ever since.  I have done what I could, but—­”

“Was she quite impossible?” asked the girl in her slow voice.  “I never saw her, you know.”

Mrs. Baxter laid down her embroidery.

“My dear, she was.  Well, I have not a word against her character, of course.  She was all that was good, I believe.  But, you know, her home, her father—­well, what can you expect from a grocer—­and a Baptist,” she added, with a touch of vindictiveness.

“What was she like?” asked the girl, still with that meditative air.

“My dear, she was like—­like a picture on a chocolate-box.  I can say no more than that.  She was little and fair-haired, with a very pretty complexion, and a ribbon in her hair always.  Laurie brought her up here to see me, you know—­in the garden; I felt I could not bear to have her in the house just yet, though, of course, it would have had to have come.  She spoke very carefully, but there was an unmistakable accent.  Once she left out an aitch, and then she said the word over again quite right.”

Maggie nodded gently, with a certain air of pity, and Mrs. Baxter went on encouraged.

“She had a little stammer that—­that Laurie thought very pretty, and she had a restless little way of playing with her fingers as if on a piano.  Oh, my dear, it would have been too dreadful; and now, my poor boy—­”