The magnificent creature stalked slowly to the doorstep, moving with the languid hauteur which befitted one whose noble height and well-grown legs gave him first rank in the army of London footmen. He was not ill-natured, but he took what he called a proper pride in himself, conscious that his livery was made by one of the most expensive tailors in the West End, and that his shoes came from Bond Street.
Lifting his arm with a haughty grace, he indicated the turning which would be Lisa’s nearest way to Charles Street.
She thanked him and tripped lightly away, he watching her with a languid gaze, too obtuse to recognize the brilliant Venetian prima donna—whose eyes, and shoulders, and diamonds he had approved the other night, when he hung over her with peaches and champagne—in the young person in rusty black.
Lisa found 99a, again a house with flowers in all the windows, and dainty silken blinds—a house of brighter and fresher aspect than the houses of Venice, where the effects of form and colour are broader, bolder, and more paintable, but lack that finish and neatness which distinguish a well-kept house at the West End of London: a house where no expenditure is spared in the struggle between the love of beauty and colour, and the curse of coal fires and gloomy skies. Another footman looked at Lisa with the cold eye of indifference, less haughty than Lady Hartley’s superb menial only because Vansittart’s smaller means did not afford prize specimens of the footman genus.
“Any answer?” asked the youth, as Lisa delivered her letter.
No, there was no answer required—but would he be sure to give the letter to Mr. Vansittart?
There was a rustle of silken skirts on the stairs as she spoke, and two ladies came tripping down, talking as they came.
“The carriage is not there yet,” cried Sophy, glancing at the open doorway. “I’m afraid we shall be late for luncheon.”
Eve followed her, and was in the hall in time to see Lisa as she turned from the door—to see her and to recognize her as the woman who had brought perplexity and apprehension into the clear heaven of her life.
The victoria came to the door. The footman stood ready to hand his mistress to her carriage and to take his place beside the coachman.