When she got up to go they watched her anxiously. She had her silver card-case in her hand. Would she leave a card or not?
Alas! in their eagerness to be polite they both accompanied her into the narrow passage and thence into the street. And Lady Alicia, being rather crowded, did not see the Benares bowl on the little table in the lobby, wherein reposed the visiting cards of Miss Esperance and Mrs. Gloag, and completely forgot to leave a similar memento of her visit.
This was a great blow to the Misses Moffat. Without the outward and visible sign of a visiting card was it a proper call or not?
Might they return it? Or was it only an act of condescension on Lady Alicia's part and not an act of friendship?
Miss Jeanie sought vainly in the pages of a bound volume of the "Lady's Home Companion" for guidance on this intricate point of etiquette. But although there was a whole long article on "calls" in that useful work, with minute directions as to the most desirable deportment at afternoon tea, there was no guidance as to what course should be taken by two genteel unmarried females when visited by an earl's daughter, who called at three in the afternoon and omitted to leave a card at all.
"It's most annoying!" Miss Jeanie exclaimed, tapping the "Lady's Home Companion" with her finger. "There's any amount about leaving cards, but not one word about when they're not left. Listen to this: 'Should there be only a lady, you would merely leave one of your husband's.' Perhaps Lady Alicia Carruthers just didn't leave one of his because he's dead, poor man. Then further on it says: 'When calling on a stranger on any business matter, your card should be sent in by the servant, who will ascertain if it is convenient for her mistress to see you.' Now she most certainly did not call on business. What are we to think, Maggie?"
Miss Maggie puckered her intellectual forehead in deep consideration of the weighty matter. Apparently she reached no conclusion, for after a minute she said: "I'm thinking, Jeanie, that our best course would be to ask Miss Esperance Bethune. She seems very intimate with Lady Alicia Carruthers, and may know her ways, and I'm quite sure she'll think none the worse of us for asking. She left a card, if you remember."
"You might just put on your bonnet and go now, Maggie. It would set our minds at rest. I wish she had left a card, though; it would have looked fine on the table in the lobby, and you mind the Macdougals are coming out to their tea on Saturday."
Miss Moffat sought Miss Esperance then and there, and that gentle little lady gave it as her opinion that the omission of the card was mere forgetfulness on Lady Alicia's part and by no means intentional. Whereupon Miss Maggie departed much comforted.
Miss Esperance happened to be dining with Lady Alicia that very evening and told her how much soul-searching her visit had occasioned the Misses Moffat.