Phyllis was peeping through the panes of the door, which afforded a view of the entrance of the house.
"She is getting out now; the footman has opened the carriage door, and Kettle is on the steps. Oh, Lucy, if Aunt Caroline had been a horse, what a hard mouth she would have had!"
In another moment a great swish of garments and the sound of a metallic voice were heard in the drawing-room, which adjoined the conservatory; and Kettle, appearing at the entrance which divided the two rooms, announced lugubriously: "Mrs. Septimus Pratt!"
A tall, angular woman, heavily draped in the crispest, most aggressive of mourning garments, was sitting upright on a sofa when the girls entered the drawing-room. She was a handsome person of her age, notwithstanding a slightly equine cast of countenance, and the absence of anything worthy the adjectives graceful or sympathique from her individuality.
Mrs. Septimus Pratt belonged to that mischievous class of the community whose will and energy are very far ahead of their intellect and perceptions. She had a vulgar soul and a narrow mind, and unbounded confidence in her own judgments; but she was not bad-hearted, and was animated, at the present moment, by a sincere desire to benefit her nieces.
"How do you do, girls?" she said, speaking in that loud, authoritative key which many benevolent persons of her sex think right to employ when visiting their poorer neighbours. "Yes, please, Fanny, a cup of tea and some bread-and-butter. Cake? No, thank you. I didn't expect to find cake!"
This last sentence, uttered with a sort of ponderous archness, as though to take off the edge of the implied rebuke, was received in unsmiling silence; even Fanny choking down in time a protest which rose to her lips.
With a sinking of the heart, Lucy heard the handle of the door turn, and saw Gertrude enter, pale, severe, and distant.
"How do you do, Gerty?" cried Aunt Caroline, "though this is not our first meeting. How came you to be standing at the gate, without your hat, and in that shabby gown?"
For Gertrude happened to be wearing an old black dress, having taken off the new mourning garment before clearing out the dusty papers.