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Rh A wild and awful surmise seized Miss Mapp.

“And your dear mother?” she said. “Where is Mrs. Poppit?”

“Mamma had to go to town this morning. She won’t be back till close on dinner-time.”

Miss Mapp’s smile closed up like a furled umbrella. The trap had snapped behind her: it was impossible now to scriggle away. She had completed, instead of spoiling, the second table.

“So we’re just eight,” said Isabel, poking at her, so to speak, through the wires. “Shall we have a rubber first and then some tea? Or tea first. What says everybody?”

Restless and hungry murmurs, like those heard at the sea-lions’ enclosure in the Zoological Gardens when feeding-time approaches, seemed to indicate tea first, and with gallant greetings from the Major, and archaistic welcomes from the Padre, Miss Mapp headed the general drifting movement towards the buffet. There may have been tea there, but there was certainly iced coffee and Lager beer and large jugs with dew on the outside and vegetables floating in a bubbling liquid in the inside, and it was all so vulgar and opulent that with one accord everyone set to work in earnest, in order that the garden should present a less gross and greedy appearance. But there was no sign at present of the red-currant fool, which was baffling.…

“And have you had a good game of golf, Major?” asked Miss Mapp, making the best of these miserable circumstances. “Such a lovely day! The white butterflies were enjoying—”

She became aware that Diva and the Padre, who had already heard about the white butterflies, were in her immediate neighbourhood, and broke off.