Page:The Lark - E Nesbit, 1922.djvu/212

Rh that her temper was going and feeling that it was almost time it did go,

"Ah!—but the white hands on the bridle-rein. Two charming girls—quite charming, I'm sure. From a child my son John was so susceptible—almost painfully susceptible."

"What?" cried Jane, in quite a new voice.

"Er—susceptible," said the other, quailing a little.

"Nonsense!" said Jane loudly, and she leapt from her chair and with one purposeful jerk she pulled up a blind. Then, with the intent ferocity of a well-bred bulldog in a good way of business, she approached the visitor, who retreated with some activity. But in vain. Jane pursued her, caught her by the console table, took her by the shoulders and shook her.

"You beast," she said vehemently, "you absolute beast!"

It was a strange scene—a scene such as that sober drawing-room had perhaps never witnessed: the shrinking figure of an elderly lady being thoroughly and systematically shaken by a small, slim girl with flame on her cheeks and daggers in her eyes. It was almost a pity that such a scene should have had no spectators. So, evidently, it appeared to the Fates, for they remedied the oversight by permitting Gladys to escape from Mrs. Doveton and enjoy the spectacle to the full through the crack of the library door.

"You beast—you little beast!" Jane repeated, and then Mrs. Rochester's bonnet fell off and Mrs. Rochester's hair came down, and it was Lucilla that Jane was shaking—Lucilla, half-laughing through the little wrinkles that were now so plainly only grease-paint, and begging for mercy in the voice that was her own.

"Don't, Jane, don't, you're choking me!"

"I should hope so," said Jane, and went on shaking.

"Didn't she do it lovely!" Gladys permitted herself to say, opening the door widely enough for that purpose.

Jane stopped shaking Lucilla.

"Have you been listening at the door?" she asked, turning like a whirlwind. "Because if you have . . ."