She led him into the dining-room and bade him watch at the window for the coming of Mr. Somerset and the doctor. Then she returned to Lucy. Young Black had got some water, and Lucy was dashing it on her servant’s face. But, though she struggled and writhed under the chill, it did not rouse her.
“What was she bringing up these things for?” asked Lucy, looking round at the scattered cutlery. “She knew I had set out the table already.”
“It’s likely there was a good deal of mental confusion before the fit came,” suggested the old governess.
Tom Black stood over the prostrate figure and the kneeling ladies. It was true he had fetched the water, but otherwise he did not seem eagerly sympathetic. Suddenly he said—
“There’s something on fire somewhere!”
“Certainly there is,” assented Lucy, her senses regaining their power of attention. “I think it must be downstairs. I can’t move.” (She was trying to support the heavy, tossing head.) “Will you both go and see what is burning, and do your best with it?”
As the old lady and the youth descended the kitchen stair he whispered to her—
“That woman is tipsy.”
“Oh, surely not!” Miss Latimer replied. “Mrs. Challoner has told me she is an excellent servant and a respectable person.”
“She is tipsy,” he repeated. “I saw it when I came in. But I didn’t think she was quite so bad as this.”