"My dear Johnnie," said Joanna, with a singular absence of any emotion but her habitual kindly satire in her voice, "you really remind me very much sometimes of an ostrich!"
XIX
Grace Jones went back to the Hostel soon after the New Year in order to pack up and to make her farewells before going for a month's holiday to her home in Wales.
"And then Plessing!" said Miss Marsh in an awed voice.
"And then Plessing," Grace assented. "Lady Vivian hopes that it will be properly started by that time as a convalescent home."
She looked across the sitting-room to where Mrs. Bullivant was sitting, with a smile that held inquiry and congratulation.
"Fancy!" ejaculated Mrs. Bullivant, with a sort of timorous pleasure, "Lady Vivian actually thought of me, and suggested my taking over the work of quarter-mistress there. You know, looking after the stores and all that sort of thing. I must say, it's very good of her, and I shall like working there—and Gracie as secretary and all, too. It'll be quite like old times."
"I hate changes," observed Miss Henderson gloomily.
"This place will be extraordinary, with you gone, Mrs. Bullivant, and Gracie, and probably Tony and Plumtree as well."