“For lunch,” said Lady Caroline freezingly, marvelling as she spoke that she should be patted, she who had taken so much trouble to come to a place, remote and hidden, where she could be sure that among other things of a like oppressive nature pattings also were not, “we will have—”
Costanza became business-like. She interrupted with suggestions, and her suggestions were all admirable and all expensive.
Lady Caroline did not know they were expensive, and fell in with them at once. They sounded very nice. Every sort of young vegetables and fruits came into them, and much butter and a great deal of cream and incredible numbers of eggs. Costanza said enthusiastically at the end, as a tribute to this acquiescence, that of the many ladies and gentlemen she had worked for on temporary jobs such as this she preferred the English ladies and gentlemen. She more than preferred them—they roused devotion in her. For they knew what to order; they did not skimp; they refrained from grinding down the faces of the poor.
From this Lady Caroline concluded that she had been extravagant, and promptly countermanded the cream.
Costanza’s face fell, for she had a cousin who had a cow, and the cream was to have come from them both.
“And perhaps we had better not have chickens,” said Lady Caroline.
Costanza’s face fell more, for her brother at the restaurant kept chickens in his back-yard, and many of them were ready for killing.
“Also do not order strawberries till I have consulted with the other ladies,” said Lady Caroline, remembering that it was only the first of April, and that perhaps people who lived in Hampstead might be poor; indeed, must be poor, or why live in Hampstead? “It is not I who am mistress here.”
“Is it the old one?” asked Costanza, her face very long.
“No,” said Lady Caroline.