“Oh, we had an enormous lunch. They’d had a dinner-party.”
“What did you have for supper?”
“Oh lots of things.”
“Bring her some suppe. I’m not sure I won’t have a basin myself.”
“All right. I’ll put some on.” The brisk steps went off and a voice hummed in and out of the other rooms.
Watching Mag stirring the fire, giving a last pull at her cigarette end and pushing back the hair from her face ... silent and old and ravaged, and young and animated and powerful, Miriam blushed and beamed silently at her reiterated demands for an account of herself.
“I say I saw an extraordinary woman downstairs.”
Mag turned sharply and put down the poker.
“Yes?”
“In a petticoat.”