"
This young and pretty girl--Miss Mildred Margrave--came and went this
morning, and a peculiar, meditative look on her face, suggesting some
recent experience, caused the artist to transfer her to his notebook. Her
step was sprightly, her face warm and cheerful in hue, her figure
excellent, her walk the most admirable thing about her--swaying, graceful,
lissom--like perfect dancing with the whole body. Her walk was immediately
merged into somebody else's--merged melodiously, if one may say so. A man
came from the pump-room looking after the girl, and Hagar remarked a
similar swaying impulsion in the walk of both. He walked as far as the
gate of the pump-room, then sauntered back, unfolded a newspaper, closed
it up again, lit a cigar, and, like Hagar, stood watching the crowd
abstractedly. He was an outstanding figure. Ladies, as they waited,
occasionally looked at him through their glasses, and the Duchess of
Brevoort thought he would make a picturesque figure for a reception--she
was not less sure because his manner was neither savage nor suburban.
George Hagar was known to some people as "the fellow who looks back of
you." Mark Telford might have been spoken of as "the man who looks through
you," for, when he did glance at a man or woman, it was with keen
directness, affecting the person looked at like a flash of light to the
eye.
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