"He dared to kiss _you!_---- I can hardly believe it." Mrs. Keene looked like a pricked balloon. "Surely you'll never go near him again now."
"Only if I can get a policeman to go with me, or an inspector of nuisances. Brownie, dear, my occasional evenings with art and old armor are over. I must find some other excuse for breaking all the rules that hedge round the life of an ex-débutante."
"Thank Heaven!" said Mrs. Keene. "I've only seen that man once and he reminded me of a person who used to go down the area of my London house and try and persuade the maids to buy imitation jewelry on the instalment plan."
Beatrix burst into a ripple of laughter. "Well done, Brownie. That's perfect,--perfect." But again her hand went up to her shoulder.
And then the hen-like lady gathered her scattered wits together and came up to her own little surprise. "It's quite time that episode is at an end, my dear," she said. "Only about ten minutes after you drove away last night,--I was having a sandwich and a glass of port wine before going to my room,--your Aunt Honoria bore down upon me. May I say that without giving offense?"
"Yes; she came straight up to these apartments, looking more like a beautiful eagle than ever,--my heart fell straight into my boots,--and asked, or rather demanded to see you."
"Aunt Honoria! But yesterday she was staying with the Mordens at Morristown."
Mrs. Keene was delighted to find that she held a full hand. "I said that you were out. My dear, she didn't take my word for it. She marched, or rather sailed along the passage to your room and stabbed your empty bed with her long, thin fingers. Of course I followed. Then she turned to me and said: 'Where is she?' I'm sure she didn't add 'woman,' but she as good as did. She always does. I was terrified. I felt like a shop-lifter before the Lord Chief Justice. She always reminds me of a great legal dignitary with her snow-white hair and aquiline nose and the cold, direct gaze."
"Thank you, Brownie, dear, for your very charming literary touch, but please go on." Beatrix was really interested and curious. Her Aunt Honoria Vanderdyke, the outstanding figure in New York's most exclusive society, at whose entrance into her box at the opera the whole house very nearly rose to its feet, did nothing without a very strong motive.