“I was not certain, when I came here,” continued Lord Peebles, disregarding this interruption, “whether I should put you out of your suspense or not, but your haggard and emaciated appearance, my dear fellow, decided me. Besides, I am two thousand pounds to the good, or nearly so, for I owe some small sum to detectives. If I did not have mercy on you, you would probably be too unwell to give your party for the princess on the 23rd, and I should be sorry to miss that. Otherwise I might have let you have a week or so more of excitement. I had several other little notions, little tunes for you to dance to.”
“You shall sit next her,” said Whately with quivering lips.
GENERAL STORIES
THE DANCE ON THE BEEFSTEAK
This Midsummer day, the early hours of which were bathed in so serene a sunshine, has ended in storm and hurly-burly. Only this morning the general outlook was as unclouded as is now the velvet blue of the star-scattered Italian sky, but this evening our very souls are driven like dead leaves before a shrivelling blast. Nature, unsympathetic, indifferent, still holds on her great unruffled courses; the stars wheel, the north wind blows lightly from across the gulf; the little ripples shed themselves in lines of phosphorescent flame; Naples lies a necklace of light on the edge of the sea, the loveliness of the Southern night is undiminished. But Mrs. Mackellar has danced on the beefsteak, and she has dismissed Seraphina.
To the dweller in cities or other light-minded and populous places this may appear but the most farcical of tragedies, worthy of no more than the scoffing laugh of a passer-by. But such do not know Mrs. Mackellar, nor Seraphina, nor life in Alatri. For in Alatri as a rule nothing happens—certainly nothing unpleasant—our lives are as smooth as the halcyon summer seas, and it will, I am afraid, be impossible to give to any but the most imaginative reader an adequate idea of the devastating nature of the catastrophe.... It will be necessary in any case to recount in brief the events of the last twenty-four hours.
Yesterday afternoon we were all en fête; Mrs. Mackellar gave a party for two reasons, either of which was amply justifiable. The first was that the engagement of Seraphina her cook to Antonio her man-servant was definitely sanctioned by her, and so made food for public rejoicing; the second that Seraphina had been with her as cook for an entire year. Now in Alatri servants do not, as a rule, stop with Mrs. Mackellar more than a few weeks. Then they leave. There is no dissatisfaction expressed and no public quarrel. They just lose their nerve and go away. But the days had added themselves into weeks, and the weeks into months, and before any of us knew where we were, Seraphina had been a year with Mrs. Mackellar. Hence the party.
There were in fact two parties, for Seraphina and Antonio entertained their friends in the kitchen, while Mrs. Mackellar received on the house-roof. She is an immense Scotchwoman, broad in bosom and in accent, and feels the heat acutely. Consequently when I received an invitation for four o’clock on an afternoon in the middle of June, it was clear that she must have a real desire to celebrate the event.