The guest at table was a young girl named Rhoda Nunn.  Tall, thin, eager-looking, but with promise of bodily vigour, she was singled at a glance as no member of the Madden family.  Her immaturity (but fifteen, she looked two years older) appeared in nervous restlessness, and in her manner of speaking, childish at times in the hustling of inconsequent thoughts, yet striving to imitate the talk of her seniors.  She had a good head, in both senses of the phrase; might or might not develop a certain beauty, but would assuredly put forth the fruits of intellect.  Her mother, an invalid, was spending the summer months at Clevedon, with Dr. Madden for medical adviser, and in this way the girl became friendly with the Madden household.  Its younger members she treated rather condescendingly; childish things she had long ago put away, and her sole pleasure was in intellectual talk.  With a frankness peculiar to her, indicative of pride, Miss Nunn let it be known that she would have to earn her living, probably as a school teacher; study for examinations occupied most of her day, and her hours of leisure were frequently spent either at the Maddens or with a family named Smithson—­people, these latter, for whom she had a profound and somewhat mysterious admiration.  Mr. Smithson, a widower with a consumptive daughter, was a harsh-featured, rough-voiced man of about five-and-thirty, secretly much disliked by Dr. Madden because of his aggressive radicalism; if women’s observation could be trusted, Rhoda Nunn had simply fallen in love with him, had made him, perhaps unconsciously, the object of her earliest passion.  Alice and Virginia commented on the fact in their private colloquy with a shamefaced amusement; they feared that it spoke ill for the young lady’s breeding.  None the less they thought Rhoda a remarkable person, and listened to her utterances respectfully.

‘And what is your latest paradox, Miss Nunn?’ inquired the doctor, with grave facetiousness, when he had looked round the young faces at his board.

’Really, I forget, doctor.  Oh, but I wanted to ask you, Do you think women ought to sit in Parliament?’

‘Why, no,’ was the response, as if after due consideration.  ’If they are there at all they ought to stand.’

‘Oh, I can’t get you to talk seriously,’ rejoined Rhoda, with an air of vexation, whilst the others were good-naturedly laughing.  ’Mr. Smithson thinks there ought to be female members of Parliament.

’Does he?  Have the girls told you that there’s a nightingale in Mr. Williams’s orchard?’

It was always thus.  Dr. Madden did not care to discuss even playfully the radical notions which Rhoda got from her objectionable friend.  His daughters would not have ventured to express an opinion on such topics when he was present; apart with Miss Nunn, they betrayed a timid interest in whatever proposition she advanced, but no gleam of originality distinguished their arguments.