Jaqueline sent him off with a pretty smile that he forgot all about when Ajax whinnied and thrust his nose into his master's hand. He had been waiting the last fifteen minutes for the well-known voice.
"Fine old fellow!" his master said, with a caressing touch of the hand. "And now we must be off, or the colonel will be in a fume."
"I'll go up in the storeroom," began Mrs. Carrington, glancing the young girl over. "Mother, I do believe that green velvet jacket would fit Miss Jaqueline. You wouldn't believe that I was once quite as slim as you?" to the young girl.
"I'm sure you're not to be called stout now," said the madam, who despised a superabundance of flesh and yet hated leanness. She was a fine, perfectly proportioned woman, straight as an arrow, in spite of her more than seventy years.
"But it always was tight in the shoulders. You see, my dear, when things are ordered abroad there's not an inch to alter them with—and then I went in mourning. Would you like to come upstairs with me?"
Patricia had gone off to look at the guineas and peacocks who had stoutly insisted upon early broods. Madam had gone over to the open window with some fine needlework. Jaqueline followed her hostess up the broad stairway, through the spacious hall lighted by the cupola above, and into an ell where the main storeroom was snugly hidden.
What big old chests, with brass and iron clamps and binding and hinges! A row of deep drawers that held the best family linen and napery, some of it saved from destruction thirty years ago in the war that was already half forgotten. There was a sweet scent about the room, made by bunches of lavender, rosemary, and a sweet clover, much cultivated in gardens, and the fragrance of dried rose leaves.
"There have been so many things laid by. We hoped there would be girls to take them," and Mrs. Carrington gave a soft sigh. "What a merry household you must be! There are younger girls—"
"Yes, Varina, our own sister, and Annis, mother's little girl."
"I am much interested in your new mother. She seems a very kindly, amiable person. Back some distance she was connected with the Carringtons, you know."