“I can’t say how she may have regarded that point,” was the cautious answer.
Calvert pushed his glass impatiently from him, and said, petulantly, “The woman is evidently a governess, or a companion, or a housekeeper. She writes her name in the book Miss Grainger, and the others are called Walter. Now, after all, a Miss Grainger might, without derogating too far, condescend to know a Fusilier, eh? Oh, here she comes again.”
The lady thus criticised had now re-entered the room, and was busily engaged in studying the announcement of steamboat departures and arrivals, over the chimney.
“It is too absurd,” said she, pettishly, in French, “to close the telegraph-office at eight, that the clerks may go to a ball.”
“Not to a ball, Madam, to the fair at Lahnech,” interposed Franz.
“I don’t care, Sir, whether it be a dance or a junketing. It is the same inconvenience to the public; and the landlord, and the secretary, as you call him, of this hotel, are all gone, and nothing left here but you.”
Whether it was the shameless effrontery of the contempt she evinced in these words, or the lamentable look of abasement of the waiter, that overcame Calvert, certain is it he made no effort to restrain himself, but, leaning back in his chair, laughed heartily and openly.
“Well, Sir,” said she, turning fiercely on him, “you force me to say, that I never witnessed a more gross display of ill breeding and bad manners.”
“Had you only added, Madam, ‘after a very long experience of life,’ the remark would have been perfect,” said he, still laughing.
“Oh, Calvert!” broke in Loyd, in a tone of deprecation; but the old lady, white with passion, retired without waiting for that apology which, certainly, there was little prospect of her receiving.