“No, Bertie,” said Lady Argent lovingly. “You would never fail her.”
“Never,” repeated Bertha with curiously intense conviction. “You see, apart from everything else, she’s the one of the three that has sought me when other things failed her. It’s an appeal that one doesn’t forget. I have to give, you know, Sybil. I’m made that way—and Rosamund has every claim on me.”
There was silence again, and Bertha only broke it to take her departure with a brisk matter-of-factness that seemed to draw a swift curtain across some intimate threshold to a sanctuary where even her own footsteps seldom penetrated.
XXX
“HAZEL and the babies are coming for a week,” announced Bertha triumphantly.
“How delightful! But oh! dear Mrs. Tregaskis, have you considered where you’re going to put them?” urgently demanded Miss Blandflower, wearing an expression of anxiety.
“Ask my landlady, Minnie.”
Miss Blandflower’s expression, now complicated by the addition of a puzzled smile, was turned towards Rosamund.
“The little balcony room for Hazel, of course, and the spare room is quite large enough for nurse and the baby—but Dickie——”
“He can have a cot in my room,” said Dickie’s grandmother quickly, “unless Hazel wants him with her. What about a nursery? They’ll be out most of the day, in this glorious weather, but it gets dark early; and then for meals——”