He touched his cap and withdrew.
A wrestle with mental arithmetic showed me that the draught which I had encountered nearly an hour before had cost me exactly one and a half guineas.
Ordinarily I should have dismissed the matter from my mind, but for some reason I had no sooner let the chauffeur go than I was tormented by a persistent curiosity regarding the identity of his considerate mistress. If I had not promised to rejoin Berry for lunch—a meal for which I was already half an hour late—I should have gone to the Berkeley and scrutinized the guests. The reflection that such a proceeding must only have been unprofitable consoled me not at all, so contrary a maid is Speculation. For the next two hours Vexation rode me on the curb. I quarrelled with Berry, I was annoyed with myself, and when the hall-porter at the Club casually observed that there was "a nasty wind," I agreed with such hearty and unexpected bitterness that he started violently and dropped the pile of letters which he was searching on my behalf.
A visit to Lincoln's Inn Fields, however, with regard to an estate of which I was a trustee, followed by a sharp walk in the Park, did much to reduce the ridiculous fever of which my folly lay sick, and I returned home in a frame of mind almost as comfortable as that in which I had set out.
It was half-past four, but no one of the others was in, so I ordered tea to be brought to the library, and settled down to the composition of a letter to The Observer.
I was in the act of recasting my second sentence, when the light went out.
By the glow of the fire I made my way to the door A glance showed me that the hall and the staircase were In darkness. It was evident that a fuse had come to a violent end.
I closed the door and returned to my seat. Then I reached for the telephone and put the receiver to my ear.
"What an extraordinary thing!" said a voice. "And you've no idea whose it was?"
"Not the slightest," came the reply. There was a musical note in the girlish tone that would have attracted any one. "There it was, on the top of the car, when we got to the Berkeley. It wasn't such a bad hat, either."