"You are Lady Diana Vernilands, I think?" she said, smiling in a friendly manner. "I am Mrs. Stanislaw. So glad to see you up."
April was instantly on the alert. Not only did she know the name of Mrs. Lionel Stanislaw, but had very good cause to remember it as that of the lady with whom she was to have shared a cabin. The smiling face had once been a pretty one, but the tide of youth was fast receding, leaving uncovered a bleak and barren shore, whose chief salients were a disdainful nose and a mouth which looked as if it might be able to say bitter things. The eyes, however, were still handsome, if supercilious, and her manners velvety. No doubt there were claws beneath the velvet, but they were not for April . . . only for the girl who was using April's name! They had not talked for five minutes before she realized that in this woman Diana had an enemy. Not that Mrs. Stanislaw's words were censorious. She was too clever for that. Her remarks were merely deprecative and full of pity.
"A most amazing creature," she said gently, "but rather disturbing to live with. I confess I wish I had been cribbed and cabined with someone who had more conventional manners and kept earlier hours."
"She is very young," she faltered at length, and was unwise enough to add, "and pretty."
These being two heinous offences in the eyes of Mrs. Stanislaw, she proceeded at once to hang, draw, and quarter the criminal. But her voice was tenderer than before.
"Yes, isn't it a pity? . . . and so foolishly indiscreet. Do you know, they tell me that she is spoken of by all the men on the ship as the April Fool, a parody on her name, which is April Poole."
Pleasant hearing for her listener, who flushed scarlet.
"Can you imagine any one who has a living to earn being so unwise? I find it difficult to believe she is going to the Cape to teach someone's children. I only hope that the story of her indiscretions will not precede her, poor girl."
April was dumb. Mrs. Stanislaw came to the conclusion that she was dull and rather lacking in feminine sweetness, and after a while went away to bargain with a native for some embroideries. She would have been delighted to know what a poisoned barb she had implanted and left quivering in the side of the so-called Lady Diana.