 played her cards no less judiciously
than she had played them in her sister's bedroom. She smiled (and her smile was
one of her strong points) whenever he spoke to her; she went through all her
little artlessness, and set forth all her little wares in what she believed to
be their most taking aspect. Who can blame her? Theobald was not the ideal she
had dreamed of when reading Byron upstairs with her sisters, but he was an
actual, within the bounds of possibility, and after all not a bad actual as
actuals went. What else could she do? Run away? She dared not. Marry beneath her
and be considered a disgrace to her family? She dared not. Remain at home and
become an old maid and be laughed at? Not if she could help it. She did the only
thing that could be reasonably expected. She was drowning; Theobald might be
only a straw, but she would catch at him - and catch at him she accordingly did.
    If the course of true love never runs smooth, the course of true matchmaking
sometimes does so. The only ground for complaint in the present case was that it
was rather slow. Theobald fell into the part assigned to him more easily than
Mrs. Cowey and Mrs. Allaby had dared to hope. He was softened by Christina's
winning manners: he admired the high moral tone of everything she said; her
sweetness towards her sisters and her father and mother, her readiness to
undertake any small burden which no one else seemed willing to undertake, her
sprightly manners, all were fascinating to one who though unused to woman's
society was still a human being. He was flattered by her unobtrusive but
obviously sincere admiration for himself; she seemed to see him in a more
favourable light and to understand him better than anyone outside of this
charming family had ever done. Instead of snubbing him as his father, brother
and sisters did, she drew him out, listened attentively to all he chose to say,
and evidently wanted him to say still more. He told a college friend that he
knew he was in love now; he really was, for he liked Miss Allaby's society much
better than that of his sisters.
    Over and above the recommendations already enumerated she had another in the
possession of what was supposed to be a very beautiful contralto voice. Her
voice was certainly contralto, for she could not reach higher than D in the
treble; its only defect was that it did not go correspondingly low in the bass;
in those days however a contralto voice was understood to
