"
Into Derby's face there came a look like that of the small boy who gazes
hungrily into a bakery shop window as he protested. "No one could know
Nina well and not love her. She is the squarest, the truest, just as she
is the most beautiful, girl in the world."
"No,"--Mr. Randolph spoke quite slowly, for him--"Nina is not
beautiful--sweet, and unspoiled, and lovable, yes; but she is not a
beauty."
Derby's face kindled with indignation, and he retorted unguardedly,
"I grant you she hasn't one of those pleased-with-itself,
don't-disturb-the-placidity-of-my-peerless-perfection sort of faces; the
valentine sort that strikes a man at first sight, but that at the end of
a week he would do anything for the sake of varying its monotony. But
Nina--the more you look at her the more lovely she becomes, _unless_ she
gets the notion that some man wants to marry her money--and then it is
time for me to take to the prairies! Her eyes get hard, her mouth goes
up on one side and her features seem to set and freeze. She has only one
hard side, but that is adamant! Poor girl, I can hardly blame her. As
she says herself, there are proposals on her breakfast tray every
morning--with all the other advertisements."
Mr. Randolph looked directly into the blue eyes before him, as though to
probe their depths.
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