"If," went on Fritzing after an anxious pause, "I was sharp with you just now—and I fear I may have been hasty—you should not take it amiss from one who, like Brutus, is sick of many griefs. Come down, Fräulein, and let me make amends."
The Princess's bell rang. At once habit impelled Annalise to that which Fritzing's pleadings would never have effected; she scrambled down the ladder, and leaving him still under her window presented herself before her mistress with her usual face of meek respect.
"I said tea," said Priscilla very distinctly, looking at her with slightly lifted eyebrows.
Annalise curtseyed and disappeared.
"How fearfully polite German maids are," remarked Tussie.
"In what way?" asked Priscilla.
"Those curtseys. They're magnificent."
"Don't English maids curtsey?"
"None that I've ever seen. Perhaps they do to royalties."
"Oh?" said Priscilla with a little jump. She was still so much unnerved by the unexpected meeting with her father on the wall of Creeper Cottage that she could not prevent the little jump.