The Countess swept a nervous curtsey, and stared at Miss Chressham.
Her plain purple coat and wide Leghorn hat, with black ribbons, had the effect not of elegance, but of insignificance. Susannah thought it ostentatious, too.
"I am rejoiced to see you," said Miss Chressham; "but 'tis difficult to say so without a set speech, and I expect you are tired—may I call you Lavinia?"
A pair of brown eyes were gravely fixed on her from under the shade of the Leghorn hat.
"If you will, please," answered Lady Lyndwood, with never the flicker of a smile.
Another coach had arrived with the servants and the baggage. Rose was half-way up the steps. He did not look at his wife, nor she at him. Susannah, under cover of the confusion of arrival, took the Countess's arm.
"You look rather fatigued," she ventured, "the roads are rough."
"I am very fatigued."
They ascended the steps together. In the doorway stood the dowager Countess, radiant in lace and gold silk.
If Rose's wife had been of her own choice, she could not have been more gracious.