Page:The time spirit; a romantic tale (IA timespiritromant00snaiiala).pdf/109

 *times been known to butt in. A classical instance was about to be furnished.

"Do tell me." Blanche suddenly looked Sarah straight in the eyes. "Has Sir Dugald been to see father?"

There was a long moment's pause in which Sarah maintained a stranglehold upon the lobster, while Lady Wargrave and the Duke, who knew they were being "ragged" by a past mistress in the art, glared daggers down the table.

"I believe so," said Sarah in an exceedingly dry voice, followed by a hardly perceptible glance at the servants.

III

Over the coffee cups, in the solemn privacy of the blue drawing-room, the Dinneford ladies grew a little less laconic. They were in a perfect hurricane of great events. Even they, who seldom use two words if one would suffice, had to make some concession to the pressure of history.

"His mother, I understand," said Aunt Charlotte, seating herself massively in the center of her floridly Victorian picture, "kept the village shop at Ardnaleuchan."

"Then I've bought bull's-eye peppermints of her," said Sarah, with a touch of acid humor which somehow became her quite well.

"But it's so serious"—Lady Wargrave stirred her coffee. "Still he's been given the Home Office—so she thinks she moves with the times, no doubt."