One of the footmen who was doubled over, red-faced and writhing, in the exercise of some pleasantry with his companion, straightened with an aggrieved air. He ambled toward us.
"Some specimens that Mr. Billings gathered--plants and foliage; he left them in the car," jerked the frump. "See they are cared for."
The man nodded indifferently and slouched away.
Her frown gloomed after him and her voice snapped at his laggard heels:
"And Flora--send Flora to me. Is she asleep somewhere?"
She faced me with an acid grimace and shrug.
"You see how it is here, Mr. Lightnut," she grumbled querulously; "but _you_ understand!"
Understand! By Jove, yes--I thought I _did_! I could see that the fellow was just sullen under the too free and easy assumptions of a guest from whom little had been experienced in the way of an occasional douceur. And dashed if I blamed him!
But I murmured some jolly rubbish, hoping every instant that Wilkes would come and lead me away.
"That's the way with them all here, from the housekeeper down," she went on gloomily. "They take advantage of the fact that the mistress of the house is abroad and the master absorbed and busy." Her voice quickened sharply: "Then do you think they care two pins about the authority of a silly girl who has been allowed to grow up untrained and ignorant of the first a b c of anything practical?"
"See here--Oh, dash it all!" I protested. "That's not _fair_, you know!"
"Fair?" She bit the word out of the air and just glared at me. "Why, they know she's a _fool_!"
I opened my mouth two or three times; then swallowed helplessly and grew red. Somehow, it came back to me--a time when I was a little boy and my nurse had been so shocked when I said "shucks!" I remembered how that night she read to me a tract about swear words and told me how when I grew up to be a big man, I would have to choose whether I was ever going to learn to swear or not. She said that if I didn't choose right, a day would come when I would be--oh, _so_ sorry!
And now, dash it, the day had come and I knew that she was right! For I _was_ sorry, by Jove!
"It's all right, miss," Wilkes reported; "at least, I hope so. Perkins is with him--we've been trying to persuade him to have a bath and lie down. But I don't know--"