‘Yes, I remember,’ Lord Francis was saying. ‘It was at St. Malo. And what did you think of the Breton peasant?’
‘Oh,’ said Jocelyn, ‘mamma has not yet allowed us to study the condition of the lower classes in France. We are all so busy with the new Settlement.’
‘It must be very exhausting, my dear child,’ said Lord Francis.
I rose.
‘I came to ask you to play something,’ the child appealed to me. ‘I have never heard you play, and everyone says—’
‘Jocelyn, my pet,’ the precise, prim utterance of Mrs. Sardis floated across the room.
‘What, mamma?’
‘You are not to trouble Miss Peel. Perhaps she does not feel equal to playing.’
My blood rose in an instant. I cannot tell why, unless it was that I resented from Mrs. Sardis even the slightest allusion to the fact that I was not entirely myself. The latent antagonism between us became violently active in my heart. I believe I blushed. I know that I felt murderous towards Mrs. Sardis. I gave her my most adorable smile, and I said, with sugar in my voice:
‘But I shall be delighted to play for Jocelyn.’