Wilkie Collins

“ Slim, supple, simply graceful in every movement, Eunice’s figure, in the charm of first youth, only waited its perfect development. Most men, looking at her as she stood at the other end of the room with her back toward us, would have guessed her age to be sixteen. ”

“ There are some people who call her ugly. I hope you don’t agree with them?”
I believe I should have lied again, if Mr. Gracedieu had not called me to the bedside.
“How does she strike you?” he whispered, eagerly. “Is it too soon to ask if she shows her age in her face?”
“Neither in her face nor her figure,” I answered: “it astonishes me that you can ever have doubted it. No stranger, judging by personal appearance, could fail to make the mistake of thinking Helena the oldest of the two.”
He looked fondly at Eunice. “Her figure seems to bear out what you say,” he went on. ”

“ She told me I shouldn’t have time to feel afraid of the great man; he would make me fond of him directly. I said, ‘Are you fond of him?’ She said, ‘Madly in love with him, my dear.’ My little friend really thinks you like her, and is very proud of it. ”