"Help me with Mrs. Lite! Get hold of her, Mr. Harrison, get hold of her!"
Mr. Harrison got hold of her, and, yelling, kicking, laughing, crying, and throwing her rounded limbs furiously abroad, the Empress was carried down the steps, placed in the "shay," and rapidly driven off. Then Mr. Harrison returned into the hall.
"Prepare for the Londoners!" he said sternly to the household, and hurried instantly off to bed.
Soon after the big clock over the Ribton Marches stables had boomed out the half-hour after twelve, a carriage drove rapidly up to the palace, followed by a second, and succeeded by a private omnibus covered with luggage. The tribe were arriving. In the first carriage sat Mrs. Verulam, pale, but full of an animation that approached excitement; Chloe, clad in a delicious suit of tweed, with perfectly-falling trousers, the newest thing in collars, a red tie, and a straw hat; and Mr. Rodney playing cicerone and looking mightily serious. Why will presently be revealed. In the second carriage was placed the faithful Marriner, amid a cloud of wraps, dressing-cases, hat-boxes, parasols, and jewel-caskets. In the omnibus sat Mr. Rodney's valet, a pale gentleman with an under-sized manner, the features of a rat, and very thin legs. Thus the vanguard approached. Chloe was apparently in fine spirits. She was talking incessantly, showing white teeth, and gazing about her with black eyes that sparkled with animation.
"Oh, is this really Ascot?" she cried. "Where is the course?"
"My dear Van Adam!" gently corrected Mr. Rodney; "the course is at some distance. This is Sunninghill."
"What a number of cupolas!" said Mrs. Verulam. "And what an enormous house! We shall be lost in it!"
"I assure you it is quite cosy inside," said Mr. Rodney, who considered the last remark as a sort of reflection upon him for engaging the house for the week. "The Lites consider it most home-like, I assure you; and they are very particular. Here is the entrance."
The gravel flew up beneath the hoofs of the high-stepping horses. The front door of the home opened wide, and discovered two footmen, behind and between whom were visible the large body and red face of Mr. Harrison, his features being decorated with an expression which it would be tame indeed to call one of suspicion. Imagine a London policeman who observes a ragged ruffian stealing out of the Tower of London with his hands full of the Crown jewels, and you may form some slight notion of the groom of the chambers' demeanour and facial attitudes on the entry of the Londoners into the hall of Ribton Marches. He had evidently been sleeping to some purpose, for he was now preternaturally wide awake, and not a person descended from the carriages, not a thing was removed therefrom, without having to run the gauntlet of his piercing and most extraordinary observation.