Page:The Old Countess (1927).pdf/77

 you know?' said Jill. In spite of Joseph her blood was not quite comfortable; he was not reassuring, somehow; older, more derelict, more disintegrated than ever. But she now saw that he wore a peasant's blouse and had on sabots clogged with mud.

'Mademoiselle saw Monsieur et Madame and told me to open,' said Joseph in his flat, impartial tones.

The explanation, when given, was self-evident. Jill and Graham stripped off their wet coats and Joseph ushered then into the salon.

There, beside a wood fire that burned brightly, sat the old lady in her bergère; fast asleep. Joseph did not announce them to his unconscious mistress. He glanced at her cursorily, and muttering, 'Mademoiselle rentrera tout-à-l ' heure, '  closed the door and left them.

'Poor old thing; how she'll hate being caught like this,' Jill whispered. 'Shall we sit down and wait?'

 ' Tout-à-l ' heure is non-committal. It's not nearly tea-time yet,' said Graham. He glanced around him as he spoke; uneasily. 'I'll wake her, I think. It would startle her to wake and find us sitting here looking at her.—She'd feel as if we were ghosts.'

And still he paused and still he looked around him. 'Is that a harp? It wasn't here last autumn.'

The tall object, standing in its green baize case at the further end of the room, was certainly a harp. 'Who plays it, I wonder?' said Jill. 'No; it wasn't here. Can it be Mademoiselle Ludérac's?'

'I don't like it; whoever plays it,' said Graham.