It had ever been her sign that she was, for all occasions, FOUND ready, without loose ends or exposed accessories or unremoved superfluities; a suggestion of the swept and garnished, in her whole splendid, yet thereby more or less encumbered and embroidered setting, that reflected her small still passion for order and symmetry, for objects with their backs to the walls, and spoke even of some probable reference, in her American blood, to dusting and polishing New England grandmothers.

If her apartment was "princely," in the clearness of the lingering day, she looked as if she had been carried there prepared, all attired and decorated, like some holy image in a procession, and left, precisely, to show what wonder she could work under pressure.

Her friend felt--how could she not ?--as the truly pious priest might feel when confronted, behind the altar, before the festa, with his miraculous Madonna.

Such an occasion would be grave, in general, with all the gravity of what he might look for.

But the gravity to-night would be of the rarest; what he might look for would depend so on what he could give.
XXXIII "Something very strange has happened, and I think you ought to know it." Maggie spoke this indeed without extravagance, yet with the effect of making her guest measure anew the force of her appeal.