"No, your Ladyship. I'll show you the way, and if Mrs. Roberts should send to inquire for your Ladyship's health——"
"Say I have been obliged to lie down by a headache, and shall not appear till lunch."
"But if anyone saw your Ladyship——"
"In that case," snapped the Marchioness, "I should be obliged to dismiss you as being untruthful."
In a good cause the Dowager was only too apt to overtax her strength, and this was probably the reason why, half an hour later, she was obliged to sink down on a wooden bench outside the door of Coombe Farm and request the privilege of resting herself for a few minutes. The farmer's wife, who, like most people of her class, took a vast interest in the guests at the Hall, knew intuitively that she was a Marchioness, and having ducked almost to the dust, rushed into the house to get her Ladyship a glass of fresh milk and impart the astounding intelligence to her lodger. A moment later Madame Darcy appeared upon the scene.
"I am going to take the liberty of introducing myself, as I have the pleasure of knowing your daughter," she said.
Her Ladyship was affable in the extreme.
"This is, indeed, a pleasure, Madame Darcy," she murmured. "Dear Isabelle was so impressed with you the other night that she has done nothing but talk of you since; but, of course, I could not have supposed my walk would have had such a charming termination. Is not your coming into the country rather unexpected?"
"Yes," replied Madame Darcy. "It is what you in this country call a whim, is it not? I am not yet quite sure of your language."
The Marchioness smiled indulgently.