Page:The Lark - E Nesbit, 1922.djvu/193

194 all over the drawing-room cushions. And Mrs. Dadd! Hateful woman! No, there's no time to tell you about her. There'll be no dinner. And those potato-faced pigs will be grunting for their swill. I don't care if I am coarse. Even now they're expecting hot water. Who's to take it up?"

"I will," said Lucilla soothingly; "and Mr. Dix will take up the luggage, and then we'll see about the dinner."

"Ill fetch him,"said Jane. "No, it's all right. I've finished snivelling. I feel much better. Catch the cat if you can and shut her up. I must bathe my eyes. I'll fetch Mr. Dix in a jiff. But I don't suppose there is any hot water. Mrs. Dadd was sprawling about on the furniture with her legs up. She always is."

"Well, she won't any more—at least, not here," said Lucilla. "Don't worry; we'll pull through somehow. It's all rather a lark though, isn't it?"

"Rub it in," said Jane, plunging her face into cold water. "I'm all right now," she went on through the towel. "It is rather exciting, as you say." And with eyelids still very pink she went in search of Mr. Dix, She did not find him, because in the hall she found Mr. Rochester, just leaving his labours in the library.

"Hullo," he said softly, "the Pigs have come then? I heard their loved voices announcing themselves and asking for Miss Quested. I expect they thought she was forty—and an experienced letter of lodgings."

"Yes," said Jane, and sniffed. "They were hateful. When I said I was Miss Quested they said they meant the elder Miss Quested, and when I said there wasn't one they snorted. They did really." She sniffed again.

He caught her hand and pulled her quickly and gently and quite irresistibly into the room he had just left.

"Half a moment," he said; "they may come down. I want to ask you, but I never get a word with you—your Lucilla's always there. I want to know . . . Gracious heavens, what's the matter!" he ended on a complete change of tone, for now he had suddenly seen Jane's face.