The sweet expression on the girl’s face went straight to Mrs Shepton’s heart.
“There’s nothing like a cup of tea to refresh one after travelling,” she said in her homely way—there were occasions on which the housekeeper could be correctly dignified and “stand-off” even to the most superior of ladies’ maids—but just now her one thought was to set this shy young creature at her ease. “You have come from Mrs Marmaduke’s home, I suppose?” she went on, as she handed the tea to Philippa. “I don’t remember rightly where it is, but it’s at several hours’ distance from here, I know.”
“It is in —shire, close to Marlby,” Philippa replied. “We left the house about eleven o’clock this morning.”
“Have you been long with your lady?” pursued Mrs Shepton. “You look so young. You couldn’t have been out in India with her, surely?”
“Oh, no, I was scarcely grown-up then. I have only just entered Mrs Headfort’s service, but,” she added, after an instant’s consideration, “she has known me a long time.”
Mrs Shepton nodded, approvingly.
“Been in the young lady’s Sunday-school class, I daresay,” she thought to herself, and aloud she added, though without any suggestion of inquisitiveness, “That is very nice; your mother must be pleased for you not to be with strangers, that is to say if—” for the seriousness of the girl’s face, and her absolutely black attire, hinted at the possibility of her having recently lost some near relation.
Philippa understood the hesitation and answered at once, speaking more quickly and brightly than hitherto.
“Oh, yes, I have a mother, and father too!”
“I am glad to hear it,” rejoined Mrs Shepton, “but, by-the-by, my dear,”—the expression denoting that the new-comer had made a marvellously rapid stride in her good graces—“you’ve not yet told me your name!”