Page:Embarrassments (New York, The Macmillan Company, 1897).djvu/169

 XI

soon as I saw Mrs. Meldrum I broke out to her. "Is there anything in it? Is her general health?"

Mrs. Meldrum interrupted me with her great amused blare. "You've already seen her and she has told you her wondrous tale? What's 'in it' is what has been in everything she has ever done—the most comical, tragical belief in herself. She thinks she's doing a 'cure'."

"And what does her husband think?"

"Her husband? What husband?"

"Hasn't she then married Lord Iffield?"

"Vous-en-êtes là?" cried my hostess. "He behaved like a regular beast."

"How should I know? You never wrote to me."

Mrs. Meldrum hesitated, covering me with what poor Flora called the particular organ. "No, I didn't write to you; and I abstained on 157