She made no answer, but looked up into my face with one of those wondrous smiles.  It went as straight to my heart as a pistol bullet could do, my high indignation proving no defence against it.  I was instantly vanquished, and as I heartily shook the hand she held out to me, I was just able to refrain from pressing it to my lips, which, now I think of it, would have been a most absurd thing for me to do.  I wonder what could have made me think of doing it!

After Dinner.  I hear Flora’s musical laugh in the mysterious boudoir, and a low, congratulatory little murmur of good humor on Etty’s part.  I believe she is afraid to laugh loud, lest I should hear her do it, and rush to the spot.  The door is ajar; I’ll storm the castle.

Flora admitted me with a shout of welcome, the instant I tapped.  Etty pushed a rocking-chair toward me, but said nothing.  The little room was almost lined with books.  Drawings, paintings, shells, corals, and, in the sunny window, plants, met my exploring gaze, but the great basket was nowhere to be seen.  It was got up for the nonce, I imagine.  Etty a rogue!

“This is the pleasantest nook in the house.  It is a shame you have not been let in before,” said Flora, zealously.  “You shall see Etty’s drawings.”  Neither of us opened the portfolio she seized, however, but watched Etty’s eyes.  They were cast down with a diffident blush which gave me pain; I was indeed an intruder.  She gave us the permission we waited for, however.  There were many good copies of lessons:  those I did not dwell upon.  But the sketches, spirited though imperfect, I studied as if they had been those of an Allston.  Etty was evidently in a fidget at this preference of the smallest line of original talent over the corrected performances which are like those of every body else.  I drew out a full-length figure done in black chalk on brown paper.  It chained Flora’s wondering attention as quite new.  It was a young man with his chair tipped back; his feet rested on a table, with a slipper perched on each toe.  His hands were clasped upon the back of his head.  The face—­really, I was angry at the diabolical expression given it by eyes looking askance, and lips pressed into an arch by a contemptuous smile.  It was a corner of this very brown sheet that I saw under her arm, when she vanished from the kitchen as I entered; the vociferous mirth which attracted me was at my expense.  Before Flora could recognize my portrait, Little Ugly pounced upon it; it fell in a crumpled lump into the bright little wood fire, and ceased to exist.

“I had totally forgotten it,” said she, with a blush which avenged my wounded self-love.  Ironical pleasure at having been the subject of her pencil I could not indulge myself in expressing, as I did not care to enlighten Little Handsome.  Any lurking pique was banished when Etty showed me, with a smile, the twilight view by the pond.

“Do you draw?” she asked; and Flora cried, “He makes caricatures of his friends with pen and ink; let him deny it if he can!”