"Oh, the usual subjects," said Miss Charman. "I am a Bachelor of Arts of London University, you know, honours in French and mathematics. And there are the training certificates. You have all that, haven't you? I got Hilda Cottering into Girton. Her father didn't want her to go. With all that money coming he thought it was waste of time. But she was a clever girl, and we used to do a great deal of work, and have a great deal of fun besides. She married young Spencer-Morton, you know, the nephew of Lord Pickering. Do you know the Pickerings, by any chance?"
And so it went on, and would have gone on interminably had not Mrs. Clinton at last risen and held out her hand as token of dismissal. Miss Charman retired affably, saying that she supposed she should hear in a day or two. She knew Mrs. Clinton must get through her list first, but she should be glad to come to her, and she would no doubt let her know the date later on.
When she had left them the two ladies looked at one another and laughed. "How delighted Edward would be with that flow of conversation!" said Lady Birkett. "It would be worth while engaging her if only to see his face when she asked him if he knew the Potterings."
"Miss Phipp is the only possible one so far," said Mrs. Clinton.
Miss Margaret Cunningham was the next. Twenty-five, with an excellent record, nice-mannered and good-looking, but the unfortunate possessor of a cockney accent of remarkably pungency. She had been a "dyly" governess only, in "Straoud" Green, where she lived, but her father had married again and she was not happy at home. Her father was Scotch. "I don't think I've got his accent, though," she said, with a smile. If she had she might have beaten Miss Phipp out of the field. Her own made her impossible.
Miss Clara Weyerhauser was young, but spectacled, short-haired and mannishly clothed. "Edward would roar the house down if I took her to Kencote," said Mrs. Clinton, when the tale of her numerous attainments had been extracted from her and she had stamped out of the room.
"It seemed odd that she should keep her hat on in the house," said Lady Birkett.
Miss Mary Mansell was too nervous, Miss Gladys Whiting too delicate-looking to make it likely that they could cope successfully with the twins. Then came Miss Jessie Barton. She was forty-two, and looked older, a lady by birth and in speech and manner, but poorly dressed, thin and worn. She had been teaching for over twenty years in good families, and had the best of references to show from each, but admitted, with a flush on her pale cheeks, that she had left her last place, over a year before, because the girls she had taught wanted a finishing governess.
"But that is just what I want for my girls," said Mrs. Clinton.
"Ah, but they are younger," she said eagerly. "Really, I am sure I could get them on well, Mrs. Clinton. And I am as strong and active as ever I was, and much more experienced. I am just coming to the time when it will be difficult to get work, and if I don't get work I must starve. I have no home to go to now, and very few friends."