"Now I must go back to Queen Anne's Mansions and sit a little while
with Mummy. Come and dine with us? There'll only be us three ... no
horrid man to fall in love with you.... You needn't put on a low
dress ... and we'll go to the dress circle at some play afterwards."
_Vivie_: "But those papers on my desk? I must have your opinion for
or against..."
_Norie_: "All right. It's half-past five. I'll give them half an
hour's study whilst you wash up the tea things and titivate. Then
we'll take a hansom to Quansions: the Underground is so grimy."
CHAPTER II
HONORIA AND HER FRIENDS
The story of Honoria Fraser was something like this: partly
guesswork, I admit. Although I know her well I can only put her past
together by deductions based on a few admitted facts, one or two
letters and occasional unfinished sentences, interrupted by
people coming in. Is it not _always_ thus with our friends and
acquaintances? I long to know all about them from their birth
(including date and place of birth and parentage) onwards; what the
father's profession was and why on earth he married the mother
(after I saw the daguerreotype portrait), and how they became
possessed of so much money, and why she went back to live with _her_
mother between the birth of her second child and the near advent of
her third. But in how very few cases do we know their whole story,
do we even care to know more than is sufficient for our purpose in
issuing or accepting invitations? There are the Dombeys--the Gorings
as they're now called, who live near us.
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