I didn’t quite see why she chose to arrive at the Grand Hotel, Bristol, in that particular disguise, nor why she entered our names in the hotel book as Grand Duchess and Princess Amalie von Starkburg, from Germany; nor did she tell me anything that evening.
But by the next afternoon, when we drove out together in a fly, I was well up in the rôle which I had to play. My lady had made me dress in a very rich black silk dress of her own, and ordered me to do my hair in a somewhat frumpish fashion, with a parting, and a “bun” at the back. She herself looked more like Royalty travelling incognito than ever, and no wonder small children and tradesmen’s boys stared open-mouthed when we alighted from our fly outside one of the mean-looking little houses in Bread Street.
In answer to our ring, a smutty little servant opened the door, and my lady asked her if Miss Jane Turner lived here and if she were in.
“Yes, Miss Turner lives here, and it bein’ Thursday and early closin’ she’s home from business.”
“Then please tell her,” said Lady Molly in her grandest manner, “that the Dowager Grand Duchess of Starkburg-Nauheim and the Princess Amalie desire to see her.”
The poor little maid nearly fell backwards with astonishment. She gasped an agitated “Lor!” and then flew down the narrow passage and up the steep staircase, closely followed by my dear lady and myself.
On the first-floor landing the girl, with nervous haste, knocked at a door, opened it and muttered half audibly:
“Ladies to see you, miss!”
Then she fled incontinently upstairs. I have never been able to decide whether that little girl thought that we were lunatics, ghosts, or criminals.
But already Lady Molly had sailed into the room, where Miss Jane Turner apparently had been sitting reading a novel. She jumped up when we entered, and stared open-eyed at the gorgeous apparitions. She was not a bad-looking girl but for the provoking, bold look in her black eyes, and the general slatternly appearance of her person.