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Gwen knew all about local class distinctions, and was aware her maid would not be "Lutwyche" to a village baker's daughter. The girl, awed into some qualification of mere assent, which might have been presumptuous, said: "Yes, my lady, if you please." Lutwyche was captured and came out. "What was it I was not to have till to-morrow morning, Lutwyche? You know quite well what I mean.
Only it was not so very clear what that was. You didn't precisely ... formulate." "Dear good papa! As if everything was an Act of Parliament! What did Norbury say?" "I only remember the upshot. Miss Lutwyche has a rather uncertain temper, and Mrs. Masham has been accustomed to be consulted." "Well and then?" "That's all I can recollect.
She was a plaguy old cat, and Miss Lutwyche, with whom she had been on very good terms in Cavendish Square, had washed her hands of her! Then, when the servants here were attentive to her and they were all right, as far as that went it was mere deceptiousness, and they were wishing her at Jericho. She was conscious that the lady's-maid and Mary Anne came back, still talking.
"Do you not think" her dignified mamma continued "you had better be getting ready for dinner? You are always longer than me." "I'm going directly. Lutwyche is never ready. I suppose I ought to go, though.... You are not asking after my old lady, and I think you might." "Oh yes," said her ladyship negligently. "I haven't seen you since you didn't go to church with me. How is your old lady?"
Very likely the log would blaze directly, and she would come on a scrap of real waste-paper. Stop!... Was not that someone coming along the passage, from the kitchen. Perhaps someone she could ask? She would not go back to her chair till she heard who it was. She set the door "on the jar" timidly, and listened. Yes she knew the voices. It was Miss Lutwyche and one of the housemaids.
Lady Gwendolen, treasuring in her heart a tale of adventure however trivial to tell at the dinner-table in the evening, submitted herself to be prepared for that function. She seemed absent in mind; and Lutwyche her maid, observing this, skipped intermediate reasonings and straightway hoped that the cause of this absence of mind had come over with the Conqueror and had sixty thousand a year.
Now, do consider that the circumstances are peculiar. Suppose he were to recover his eyesight!" "You mean he wouldn't be able to bear the shock of finding out what he'd got to marry...." She was interrupted by her mother exhibiting consciousness of the presence of Lutwyche, whose exit was overdue. A very trustworthy young woman, no doubt; but a line had to be drawn.
If ever you retell the tale you can make it do so. But whatever you do be careful to insist on that point of not talking before the servants. Dwell on the fact that Miss Lutwyche went straight to the Servants' Hall, after putting a finishing touch on her young ladyship, and said to the housekeeper: "You'll be very careful, Mrs. Masham, to say nothing whatever about her young ladyship and Mr.
Lutwyche caught up the party, which had not stopped for the finding of the letter, at the drawing-room door. Gwen opened it as she entered the room, saying, to anyone within hearing: "Excuse my reading this." She dropped on a sofa at hand, close to a chandelier rich with wax lights in the lampless drawing-room.
And then old Maisie waked from a dream about unmanageable shrimps, to utter the correct formula with a conviction of its truth, this time. She had only just closed her eyes. Only just! Miss Lutwyche, in attendance, ventured on sympathetic familiarity. Mrs. Picture would not get any beauty-sleep to-night, that was certain.
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