Page:Leon Wilson - Ruggles of Red Gap.djvu/44

30 Effie, who had paid no heed to his outburst. "Get him done right for once."

Her relative continued to nibble nervously at a bit of toast.

"I've done something with him myself," she said, watching him narrowly. "At first he insisted on having the whole bill-of-fare for breakfast, but I put my foot down, and now he's satisfied with the continental breakfast. That goes to show he has something in him, if we can only bring it out."

"Something in him, indeed, yes, Madam!" I assented, and Cousin Egbert, turning to me, winked heavily.

"I want him to look like some one," she resumed, "and I think you're the man can make him if you're firm with him; but you'll have to be firm, because he's full of tricks. And if he starts any rough stuff, just come to me."

"Quite so, Madam," I said, but I felt I was blushing with shame at hearing one of my own sex so slanged by a woman. That sort of thing would never do with us. And yet there was something about this woman—something weirdly authoritative. She showed rather well in the morning light, her gray eyes crackling as she talked. She was wearing a most elaborate peignoir, and of course she should not have worn the diamonds; it seemed almost too much like the morning hour of a stage favourite; but still one felt that when she talked one would do well to listen.

Hereupon Cousin Egbert startled me once more.

"Won't you set up and have something with us, Mr. Ruggles?" he asked me.

I looked away, affecting not to have heard, and could feel Mrs. Effie scowling at him. He coughed into his cup