It is such a pretty
title!"
"Duchess is commonly thought a prettier one," stammered
Dunbeg, much embarrassed. The young man was not used to chaff
from women.
"I should be satisfied with Countess. It sounds well. I am surprised
that you don't like it." Dunbeg looked about him uneasily for some
means of escape but he was barred in. "I should think you would
feel an awful responsibility in selecting a Countess. How do you
do it?"
Lord Dunbeg nervously joined in the general laughter as Sybil
ejaculated:
"Oh, Victoria!" but Miss Dare continued without a smile or any
elevation of her monotonous voice:
"Now, Sybil, don't interrupt me, please. I am deeply interested in
Lord Dunbeg's conversation. He understands that my interest is
purely scientific, but my happiness requires that I should know
how Countesses are selected.
Lord Dunbeg, how would you recommend a friend to choose a
Countess?"
Lord Dunbeg began to be amused by her impudence, and he even
tried to lay down for her satisfaction one or two rules for selecting
Countesses, but long before he had invented his first rule, Victoria
had darted off to a new subject.
"Which would you rather be, Lord Dunbeg? an Earl or George
Washington?"
"George Washington, certainly," was the Earl's courteous though
rather bewildered reply.
"Really?" she asked with a languid affectation of surprise; "it is
awfully kind of you to say so, but of course you can't mean it.
"Indeed I do mean it.
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