Page:What Maisie Knew (Chicago & New York, Herbert S. Stone & Co., 1897).djvu/144

130 her up and ease her off and smooth her down! If I 've been an 'ipocrite it 's the other way round: I 've pretended to him and to her, to myself and to you and to every one, not to see! It serves me right to have held my tongue before such horrors!" What horrors they were her companion forbore too closely to inquire, showing even signs not a few of an ability to take them for granted. That put the couple more than ever, in this troubled sea, in the same boat, so that with the consciousness of ideas on the part of her fellow-mariner Maisie could sit close and wait. Sir Claude on the morrow came in to tea, and then the ideas were produced. It was extraordinary how the child's presence drew out their full richness. The principal one was startling, but Maisie appreciated the courage with which her governess handled it. It simply consisted of the proposal that whenever and wherever they should take refuge Sir Claude should consent to share their asylum. On his protesting with all the warmth in nature against this note of secession she asked what else in the world was left to them if her ladyship should stop supplies.

"Supplies be hanged, my dear woman!"