“Well, bring those letters over here—that pile on the table. We may as well get through them.”
Annie immediately found note-paper, blotting-paper, pens and ink, also a supply of foreign stamps and post-cards. She laid the letters in a pile on Lady Lushington’s lap.
“Now,” she said, “if you will read them aloud to me and tell me what to say, I will write as slowly as ever you like. You can lean back in your comfortable chair; we will get through them as quickly as possible.”
This conversation took place on the first day when Annie wrote letters to Lady Lushington’s dictation. Soon the thing became a habit, and Lady Lushington secured the services of Miss Brooke for a couple of hours daily. She quite enjoyed it. It was so much less trouble, sitting lazily in her chair and getting that smart, pretty little thing to do the toilsome work for her. She felt that Annie was assuredly pretty, and much more interesting than poor Priscilla.
At last, on a day when the ladies had been at Interlaken for over a week, and were meaning to move on to Zermatt, Lady Lushington opened a letter, the contents of which caused her face to flush and her eyes to blaze with annoyance.
“Really,” she said, “this is too bad; this is simply abominable!”
“What is the matter?” asked Annie.
She had guessed, however, what the matter was, and her heart beat as she made the remark, for that morning she had seen, lying on the breakfast-table amongst a pile of letters directed to Lady Lushington, one in the well-known writing of Mrs Priestley; and if Annie had any doubt on that point, the dressmaker’s address was printed on the flap of the envelope. Her innocent eyes, however, never looked more innocent as she glanced up now from the blank sheet of paper on which she was about to write.
“Of course you know nothing about it, child,” said Lady Lushington, “but it is beyond belief; Mabel’s extravagance exceeds all bounds; I will not permit it for a single moment.”
“Mabel’s extravagance?” said Annie, looking surprised. “But surely dear Mabel is not extravagant. I have never, never noticed it; I assure you I haven’t.”