“Eh?” said the willowy gentleman, slightly startled.
The landlord held the door wide, and Miss Charing, a serviceable if not beautiful cloak huddled about her form, appeared on the threshold, and there halted. The strings of her hood were tied tightly under her chin, and the resulting frill of drab woollen-cloth unbecomingly framed a face whose nose was pink-tipped with cold. There was nothing romantic about Miss Charing’s appearance, but her entrance would not have shamed a Siddons. “You!” she uttered, in accents of loathing. “I might have known it!”
The Honourable Frederick Standen was faintly puzzled. It seemed to him that Miss Charing was both surprised and displeased to see him. He expostulated. “Dash it, Kitty, I was invited!”
“I thought better of you!” said Miss Charing tragically.
“You did?” said Mr. Standen, sparring for wind. His gaze, not wholly unlike that of a startled hare, alighted on the table; he fancied he could perceive a glimmer of light. “Yes, but you know what my uncle is!” he said. “Dines at five, or he did when I was last down here! Nothing for it but to snatch a mouthful on the way.”
“ That!” said Miss Charing, with withering scorn. “I don’t care where you dine, Freddy, but that you should have come to Arnside gives me a very poor notion of you, let me tell you! Not that I ever had anything else, for you’re as bad as Dolph—worse!”
Mr. Standen, considering the matter, was moved to expostulate again. “No, really, Kitty! Pitching it too strong!” he said. “The poor fellow’s queer in his attic!” It occurred to him that Mr. Pluckley’s interested presence might with advantage be dispensed with. He indicated this briefly and simply, and Mr. Pluckley regretfully withdrew.
Miss Charing, who shared with her governess a taste for romantic fiction, toyed with the idea of remaining (a statue of persecuted virtue) by the door, but succumbed to the lure of a fire. Seating herself on the settle beside it, she untied the strings of her cloak, pushed back the hood from her ruffled curls, and stretched benumbed hands to the blaze.
“I’ll tell you what it is!” offered Mr. Standen. “You’re cold! Put you in a miff! Have some brandy!”
Miss Charing declined the invitation contemptuously. She added: “You need not have put yourself to the trouble of travelling all the way from London. You have quite wasted your time, I assure you!”