But to Dick Stamford, who entered as luncheon was announced, they were a delightful and yet familiar surprise. He had known stockings to fill the horizon before, and the general impression which the Webster girls gave, and Phyllis in particular, of having more eyes and hair and neck than other people, created an atmosphere in which he was absolutely at home.
And Mrs. Stamford was so pleased to see Dick roused from the rather sullen lethargy which was becoming habitual with him, that she began to see the Webster girls in a pleasant light too, in spite of the fact that they outraged all her inherent prejudices every minute. And yet she was a woman of strong character. But it is upon the strongest that mother-love works such ironic miracles.
“Really,” said Mrs. Dixon, seating herself at table in the beautiful old dining-room, with a feeling that here—in places like this—was where she and the girls belonged, “really, I must describe the tapestry in your hall to Lady Jones. Lady Jones is a friend of mine whose husband has just bought an estate—almost fabulously wealthy, or seems so to a poor woman who can only just afford to live.” And she gave her bangles and her expensive gown a sort of quivering movement to indicate, with subtlety, that the circles were indeed wealthy where she could be considered poor.
“The tapestry? Oh, my husband could tell you all about that, but, unfortunately, he is not well to-day, and obliged to remain in his room.”
“I said to Lady Jones when she consulted me about her house, ‘Old masters in the hall, of course. But I see now I made a mistake. I shall now advise tapestry exactly like yours.’ ”
“I’m afraid,” said Mrs. Stamford with a suspicion of dryness, “that Lady Jones will have rather a job to find it.”
Mrs. Dixon glanced at Mrs. Stamford’s coat and skirt, which bore obvious signs of wear, and at the exquisitely fine linen tablecloth, which was darned in three places.
“Look here,” she said. “You don’t seem to care very much for the tapestry, and I know if I just advise Lady Jones, she will be ready to give anything—anything. Now—can I? I should be so pleased. I know what agricultural depression is.”
She leaned back, feeling nothing could ever be more delicately done, but Mrs. Stamford paused, fork in mid-air, and stared at her guest with an expression that roused her son’s sense of the ridiculous.
“Ha-ha!” he laughed. “That’s good! Ask the mater to sell her nose while you are doing, Mrs. Dixon.”