“Are you soaked, dear?”
“A little damp,” I admitted.
“I’ll get Maria to make us some tea,” said Sam, “and I’ll take you up to Mr. Wake’s room, and you can shed that once-perky, now depressed frock and put on one of his dressing gowns. And then come down, and we’ll toast you up before the fire I make while you change—”
“All right,” I agreed.
“This way, dear—” he said then, and I went with him up a twisting stairs that had a wrought-iron balustrade, over which was growing a vine that had its feet in a brick colored jardiniere. . . . It was a very, very pretty house, and more than that. It was built for comfort too. There were soft, deep low chairs all around, and ash trays on tiny tables, and magazines, and books—hundreds of books in every room—I kept thinking of how Miss Sheila would like it.
After I had taken off my dress, and hung it over the only chair in the room that wouldn’t be hurt by moisture, I put on the dark green dressing gown that Sam had laid out for me, and went down stairs again—holding the robe up around me, for of course it was miles long for me, and it made me go carefully for fear I would trip.
Sam had two chairs before the big fireplace, and in this a few sticks were burning. When he saw me, he laughed, and I laughed too, and then we settled. Maria came in with a tray that had on it an orange china tea set, that looked very pretty on that dull, gray day, and there were yellow flowers tucked into each napkin, and she had orange cake, and mayonnaise and egg sandwiches to eat with our tea, and so the color scheme was quite perfect.
After I had eaten three sandwiches and was about to begin on another—I wasn’t very hungry, it hadn’t been long since lunch—I spoke. “Sam,” I said, “don’t you think some one ought to tell them it’s raining?”
“Not by a good deal!” he answered, as he poured himself some fresh tea. “They’ll get on to it sometime, all by themselves—”
“Miss Sheila’s been sick,” I added. I was a little bit worried, but Sam answered that he thought the soaking wouldn’t hurt her, and it didn’t, and he added the statement that he didn’t believe Mr. Wake would be grateful for any interruption just then.