“Yes,” said Kathleen. “Really, Eliza, you are most extraordinary. How did you know?”
“I've heard of him,” said Eliza. “I think I ought to warn you against him, miss. He's—he's a counterfeiter.”
“Nonsense, Eliza. What notions you do have! He's an antiquarian, and he's coming to see my father about archaeology. He's a friend of Miss Josephine, from Oxford. Now I think you'd better get on with your cooking and not worry about counterfeiters.”
“Miss Kathleen,” said Eliza, “I think I'd better be frank with you. I want to tell you—”
Here Mary came into the kitchen, and although Eliza Thick made frantic gestures to her to keep away, the housemaid was too dense to understand. The opportunity for confession was lost.
“Now, Eliza,” said Kathleen, “Mary will help you in anything you're not certain about. I'll come down again later to see how you're getting on.”
By supper time that night Eliza Thick began to think that perhaps she had made a tactical error by interning herself in the kitchen where there was but small opportunity for a tete-a-tete with the bewitching Kathleen. The news that Blair was coming to the evening meal was highly disconcerting, and the worried cook even contemplated the possibility of doctoring the American's plate of soup with ratsbane or hemlock. Once during the afternoon she ventured a sally upstairs (carrying a scuttle of coal as a pretext) in the vague hope of finding Kathleen somewhere about the house. Unfortunately she met Mrs. Kent on the stairs, who promptly ordered her back to her proper domain. Here Eliza found a disreputable-looking person trying to cozen Mary into admitting him to the house. He claimed to be an agent of the gas company, in search of a rumoured leak. Eliza immediately spotted Priapus, and indignantly ejected him by force of arms. In the scuffle a dish pan and several chairs were overturned. Mary, whose nerves were rather unstrung by the sustained comedy she was witnessing, uttered an obbligato of piercing yelps which soon brought Kathleen to the scene. Eliza received a severe rating, and so admired the angry sparkle in Kathleen's eyes that she could hardly retort.
“One other thing, Eliza,” said Kathleen, in conclusion. “There are to be two guests at supper. Mr. Carter, a curate from Oxford, is coming, too. Please allow for him in your preparations.”
“If you please, Miss,” cried the much-goaded cook, “is that Mr. Stephen Carter?”
“I believe it is,” said Kathleen, “but what of it? Is he a counterfeiter, too?”