“I will do my best to please Mrs. Hallam, but I will not be subject to that woman,” she thought, just as some one knocked, and in response to her “Come in,” Mrs. Haynes appeared, saying, “Leighton, Mrs. Hallam wants you.”
“Madam, if you are speaking to me, I am Miss Leighton,” Bertha said, while her eyes flashed so angrily that for a moment Mrs. Haynes lost her self command and stammered an apology, saying she was so accustomed to hearing the English employees called by their last names that she had inadvertently acquired the habit.
There was a haughty inclination of Bertha’s head in token that she accepted the apology, and then the two, between whom there was now war, went to Mrs. Hallam’s room, where Bertha unlocked a trunk and took out a fresher dress. While she was doing this, Mrs. Hallam again stepped out upon the balcony with Mrs. Haynes, who said;
“It is too late for table d’hôte, but I have ordered a nice little extra dinner for you and me, to be served in our salon. I thought you’d like it better there the first night. Grace has dined and gone to the Casino with a party of English, who have rooms under us. The king is to be there.”
“Do you know him well?” Mrs. Hallam asked, pleased at the possibility of hobnobbing with royalty.
“Ye-es—no-o. Well, he has bowed to me, but I have not exactly spoken to him yet,” was Mrs. Haynes’s reply, and then she went on hurriedly, “I have engaged seats for lunch and dinner for you, Grace and myself in the salle-à-manger, near Lady Gresham’s party, and also a small table in a corner of the breakfast-room where we can be quite private and take our coffee together, when you do not care to have it in your salon. Grace insists upon going down in the morning, and of course, I must go with her.”
“You are very kind,” Mrs. Hallam said, thinking how nice it was to have all care taken from her, while Mrs. Haynes continued:
“Your servants take their meals in the servants’ hall. Celine will naturally prefer to sit with her own people, and if you like I will arrange to have places reserved with the English for your courier and—and——”
She hesitated a little, until Mrs. Hallam said, in some surprise:
“Do you mean Miss Leighton?”