The lady, her hand stretched out, advanced in the most condescending fashion. Mrs. Harland shrank away.
"Louisa Brown!" she cried.
"Louisa Brown--that was; Mrs. Bindon--that is! Let me give you my card. I had some printed just before I came away."
After some fumbling the lady produced from her pocket a gorgeous mother-of-pearl card-case. Out of it she took a piece of pasteboard, resplendent in all the colours of the rainbow, about four inches square. This she offered Mrs. Harland. That lady declined it with a gesture.
"Won't you have it? Well, I'll put it on the mantelpiece; it'll be just the same. Dear old-fashioned mantelpieces! We don't have them out our way--we're in advance, you know--but I remember them so well."
The lady suited the action to the word. She placed the piece of cardboard on the mantelpiece in the most conspicuous place, on top of the clock. Apparently unconscious that in Mrs. Harland's demeanour there was anything peculiar, she carefully selected the largest armchair the room contained. In it she placed her ample person. As she arranged her skirts she remarked:
"I've come all this way to see them boys of mine. The dear lads! How are they? I hope you haven't made them too English. A little English I don't mind, being English as it were myself; but too much English I can't abide."
"You--impudent--creature!"
The lady put up her pince-nez.
"My stars! Here's goings on! May I ask if that remark was addressed to me?"