There was something fixed and mechanical in the
serenity painted on it; this was not an expression, Ralph said-it
was a representation, it was even an advertisement. She had lost her
child; that was a sorrow, but it was a sorrow she scarcely spoke of;
there was more to say about it than she could say to Ralph. It
belonged to the past, moreover; it had occurred six months before
and she had already laid aside the tokens of mourning. She appeared to
be leading the life of the world; Ralph heard her spoken of as
having a "charming position." He observed that she produced the
impression of being peculiarly enviable, that it was supposed, among
many people, to be a privilege even to know her. Her house was not
open to every one, and she had an evening in the week to which
people were not invited as a matter of course. She lived with a
certain magnificence, but you needed to be a member of her circle to
perceive it; for there was nothing to gape at, nothing to criticize,
nothing even to admire, in the daily proceedings of Mr. and Mrs.
Osmond. Ralph, in all this, recognized the hand of the master; for
he knew that Isabel had no faculty for producing studied
impressions.
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