“What about Mrs. Harter?”
“Oh, no. You see, she won’t be actually in the play, anyhow. They only want her to sing before the curtain goes up and then again at the end.”
“Do you know that they are all coming here this evening to sing? Sallie invited them that time they went to Nancy Fazackerly’s. Mrs. Harter, too.”
“I’m glad.”
So I was. What Nancy had told me of Diamond Harter made me feel sorry for her, in spite of her aggressive airs. I wanted her to go to Mary Ambrey’s house, in the atmosphere of sanity, and kindness, and serenity, that belongs to Mary.
When I got home, I found Claire entertaining Lady Annabel Bending.
I felt sure that she had come to hear about the dance that we proposed to give. The invitations had only just been sent out, but in Cross Loman we are never long in ignorance of one another’s arrangements.
Miss Emma Applebee, before now, has darted out of her shop and inquired of me solicitously how her Ladyship’s cold is, when I myself had only been made aware of its existence about an hour earlier.
Lady Annabel was inclined to be rather grave, although courteous, about our entertainment. Did we realize quite what we were undertaking, especially—if she might say so—with an invalid in the house?
She glanced at me.