CHAPTER XVI
TOWARD half-past ten the next day, a few minutes after Rod left for the theater, she was in the bathroom cleaning the coffee machine. There came a knock at the door of the sitting-room bedroom. Into such disorder had her mood of depression worried her nerves that she dropped the coffee machine into the washbowl and jumped as if she were seeing a ghost. Several dire calamities took vague shape in her mind, then the image of Freddie Palmer, smiling sweetly, cruelly. She wavered only a moment, went to the door, and after a brief hesitation that still further depressed her about herself she opened it. The maid—a good-natured sloven who had become devoted to Susan because she gave her liberal fees and made her no extra work—was standing there, in an attitude of suppressed excitement. Susan laughed, for this maid was a born agitator, a person who is always trying to find a thrill or to put a thrill into the most trivial event.
"What is it now, Annie?" Susan asked.
"Mr. Spenser—he's gone, hasn't he?"
"Yes—a quarter of an hour ago."
Annie drew a breath of deep relief. "I was sure he had went," said she, producing from under her apron a note. "I saw it was in a gentleman's writing, so I didn't come up with it till he was out of the way, though the boy brought it a little after nine."
"Oh, bother!" exclaimed Susan, taking the note.
"Well, Mrs. Spenser, I've had my lesson," replied Annie, apologetic but firm. "When I first came to New York, green as the grass that grows along the edge of the spring, what does I do but go to work and take up a note to a lady when her husband was there! Next thing I knew he went to work and hauled her round the floor by the hair and skinned out—yes, beat it for good. And my madam says to me, 'Annie, you're fired. Never give a note to a lady when her gent is by or to a gent when his lady's by. That's the first rule of life in gay New York.' And you can bet I never have since—nor never will."
Susan had glanced at the address on the note, had recognized the handwriting of Brent's secretary. Her heart had straightway sunk as if the foreboding of calamity had been realized. As she stood there uncertainly, Annie seized the opportunity to run on and on. Susan now said absently, "Thank you. Very well," and closed the door. It was a minute or so before she tore open the envelope with an impatient gesture and read: