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THE EUROPEANS.
[CH.
our good friend should perform a like ceremony for himself and Lizzie Acton."
The Baroness threw back her head and smiled at her uncle; then turning, with an intenser radiance, to Robert Acton, "I am certainly very stupid not to have thought of that," she said. Acton looked down at his boots, as if he thought he had perhaps reached the limits of legitimate experimentation, and for a moment Eugenia said nothing more. It had been, in fact, a sharp knock, and she needed to recover herself. This was done, however, promptly enough. "Where are the young people?" she asked.
"They are spending the evening with my mother."
"Is not the thing very sudden?"
