noon
Leave being readily given , he visited the house in Regent 's Park , which he declared to be an inexhaustible storehouse of treasure . He deeply regretted , he said , that he could not show the portrait to Miss Gisborne . Lydia replied that if Miss Gisborne would come and look at it , she should be very welcome . Two days later , at noon , Mrs. Byron arrived and found Lydia alone ; Alice having contrived to be out , as she felt that it was better not to meet an actress -- one could never tell what they might have been . The years that had elapsed since Mrs. Byron 's visit to Dr. Moncrief had left no perceptible trace on her ; indeed she looked younger now than on that occasion , because she had been at the trouble of putting on an artificial complexion . Her careless refinement of manner was so different from the studied dignity and anxious courtesy of the actor-manager , that Lydia could hardly think of them as belonging to the same profession . Her voice was not her stage voice ; it gave a subtle charm to her most commonplace remarks , and it was as different as possible from Cashel 's rough tones .