CHAPTER XXI
Awfully Jolly
When life becomes a spasm,
And history a whiz,
If that is not sensation,
I don’t know what it is.—LEWIS CARROLL
“Is Lady Rosamond at home?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Nor Mrs. Charnock?”
“No, ma’am; they are both gone down to the Rectory.”
“Would you ask whether Mrs. Poynsett would like to see me?”
“I’ll inquire, ma’am, if you will walk in,” said Mr. Jenkins moved by the wearied and heated looks of Miss Vivian, who had evidently come on foot at the unseasonable visiting hour of 11.15 a.m.
The drawing-room was empty, but, with windows open on the shady side, was most inviting to one who had just become unpleasantly aware that her walking capacity had diminished under the stress of a London season, and that a very hampering one. She was glad of the rest, but it lasted long enough to be lost in the uncomfortable consciousness that hers was too truly a morning call, and she would have risen and escaped had not that been worse.
At last the door of communication opened, and to her amazement Mrs. Poynsett was pushed into the room by her maid in a wheeled chair. “Yes, my dear,” she said, in reply to Eleonora’s exclamation of surprise and congratulation, “this is my dear daughters’ achievement; Rosamond planned and Anne contrived, and they both coaxed my lazy bones.”