She came in, examining one finger of her right hand; and, without looking at him, began to speak with severity:
"I told you, Mr. Simpson, I could not possibly see anybody in my practising hours! How am I ever to keep up my poor music in this beastly country?" Then she added, in a pettish undertone: "I have broken my nail now!" And glancing up, accusingly, to behold a stranger: "Oh!" she exclaimed.
Major Bethune smiled. The sight of this creature, so unmistakably fresh from the salt brisk English shores, was as pleasant as it was unexpected.
"Oh, it's not Mr. Simpson!" she cried, with a quaint air of discovery.
The officer bowed. Life had taught him not to waste his energy on a superfluous word.
"Oh!" she said again. She looked down at her nail once more, and then sucked it childishly. Over her finger she shot a look at him. She had very bright hazel eyes, under wide full brows. "Perhaps," she said, "you want to see the Runkle? I mean," she interrupted herself, with a little giggle—"I mean, my uncle, Sir Arthur."
"I called to see Lady Gerardine," he answered imperturbably. "I wrote to her yesterday. She expects me."
"Oh!"
Every time this ejaculation shot from the girl's lips it was with a new lively note of surprise and a comical rounding of small mouth and big eyes. Then she remembered her manners; and, plunging down on a chair herself:
"Won't you take a seat?" she cried, with an engaging schoolgirl familiarity.