Page:The Awkward Age (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1899).djvu/52

THE AWKWARD AGE as if she wished with dim perversity that she were. "Every one, at any rate, is awfully kind to Harold." She waited a moment, to give her visitor the chance to pronounce it eminently natural, but no pronouncement came—nothing but the footman who had answered her ring and of whom she ordered tea. "And where did you say you're going?" she inquired after this.

"For Easter?" The Duchess achieved a direct encounter with her charming eyes—which was not, in general, an easy feat. "I didn't say I was going anywhere. I haven't, of a sudden, changed my habits. You know whether I leave my child—except in the sense of having left her an hour ago at Mr. Garlick's class in Modern Light Literature. I confess I'm a little nervous about the subjects and am going for her at five."

"And then where do you take her?"

"Home to her tea—where should you think?"

Mrs. Brookenham declined, in connection with the matter, any responsibility of thought; she did indeed much better by saying after a moment: "You are devoted!"

"Miss Merriman has her afternoon—I can't imagine what they do with their afternoons," the Duchess went on. "But she's to be back in the school-room at seven."

"And you have Aggie till then?"

"Till then," said the Duchess cheerfully. "You're off, for Easter, to—where is it?" she continued.

Mrs. Brookenham had received with no flush of betrayal the various discriminations thus conveyed by her visitor, and her only revenge, for the moment, was to look as sweetly resigned as if she really saw what was in them. Where were they going for Easter? She had to think an instant, but she brought it out. "Oh, to Pewbury—we've been engaged so long that I had forgotten. We go once a year—one does it for Edward."

"Ah, you spoil him!" smiled the Duchess. "Who's to be there?" 42