“He was in the field two years.  He told me so this afternoon.  I dare say, he has earned his title, even if he is a lieutenant.”

“Don’t be so highty-tighty, Cornelia.  I have no objections to military titles.  They mean something; for they at least imply, that a man is willing to fight if his country will find him a quarrel to fight in.  In fact, I rather lean to official titles of every kind.”

“I have not thought of them at all.”

“But I have.  They affect me like the feathers in a cock’s tail; of course the bird would be as good without them, but fancy him!” and Arenta laughed mirthfully at her supposition.  “As for women,” she continued, “lady, or countess, or Marquise, what an air it gives!  It finishes a woman like a lace ruff round her neck.  Every woman ought to have a title—­I mean every woman of respectability.  I have a fancy to be a marquise, and Aunt Jacobus says I look Frenchy enough.  I have heard that there is a title in the Hyde family.  I must ask Aunt Jacobus.  She knows everything about everybody.  Lieutenant Hyde!  I do wonder what he is coming for!”

The words dropped slowly, one by one, from her lips; and with a kind of fateful import; but neither of the girls divined the significance of the inquiry.  Both were too intent on those last little touches to the toilet, which make its effectiveness, to take into consideration reflections without form; and probably, at that time, without personal intention.

Then Arenta, having arranged her ringlets, tied her sash, and her sandals, began to talk of her own affairs; for she was a young lady who found it impossible to be sufficient for herself.  There had been trouble with the slaves in the Van Ariens’ household, and she told Cornelia every particular.  Also, she had very near had an offer of marriage from George Van Berckel; and she went into explanations about her diplomacies in avoiding it.

“Poor George!” she sighed, and then, looking up, was a trifle dismayed at the expression upon Cornelia’s face.  For Cornelia was as reticent, as Arenta was garrulous; and the girls were incomprehensible to each other in their deepest natures, though, superficially, they were much on the same plane, and really thought themselves to be distinctly sympathetic friends.

“Why do you look so strangely at me, Cornelia?” asked Arenta.  “Am I not properly dressed?”

“You are perfectly dressed, Arenta.  Women as fair as you are, know instinctively how to dress.”  And then Arenta stood up before the mirror and put her hand upon Cornelia’s shoulder, and they both looked at the reflection in it.

A very pretty reflection it was!—­a slender girl with a round, fair face, and a long, white throat, and sloping shoulders.  Her pale brown hair fell in ripples and curls around her until they touched a robe of heavenly blue, and half hid a singular necklace of large pearls:—­pearls taken from some Spanish ship and strung in old Zierikzee, and worn for centuries by the maids and dames of the house of Van Ariens.