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Page 61
"Mr. Marson, permit me to introduce you to Mr. Ferris, Lord
Stockheath's gentleman."
Mr. Ferris, a dark, cynical man, with a high forehead, shook Ashe
by the hand.
"Happy to meet you, Mr. Marson."
"Miss Willoughby, this is Mr. Marson, who will take you in to
dinner. Miss Willoughby is Lady Mildred Mant's lady. As of course
you are aware, Lady Mildred, our eldest daughter, married Colonel
Horace Mant, of the Scots Guards."
Ashe was not aware, and he was rather surprised that Mrs. Twemlow
should have a daughter whose name was Lady Mildred; but reason,
coming to his rescue, suggested that by our she meant the
offspring of the Earl of Emsworth and his late countess. Miss
Willoughby was a light-hearted damsel, with a smiling face and
chestnut hair, done low over her forehead.
Since etiquette forbade that he should take Joan in to dinner,
Ashe was glad that at least an apparently pleasant substitute had
been provided. He had just been introduced to an appallingly
statuesque lady of the name of Chester, Lady Ann Warblington's
own maid, and his somewhat hazy recollections of Joan's lecture
on below-stairs precedence had left him with the impression that
this was his destined partner. He had frankly quailed at the
prospect of being linked to so much aristocratic hauteur.
When the final introduction had been made conversation broke out
again. It dealt almost exclusively, so far as Ashe could follow
it, with the idiosyncrasies of the employers of those present. He
took it that this happened down the entire social scale below
stairs. Probably the lower servants in the servants' hall
discussed the upper servants in the room, and the still lower
servants in the housemaids' sitting-room discussed their
superiors of the servants' hall, and the stillroom gossiped about
the housemaids' sitting-room.
He wondered which was the bottom circle of all, and came to the
conclusion that it was probably represented by the small
respectful boy who had acted as his guide a short while before.
This boy, having nobody to discuss anybody with, presumably sat
in solitary meditation, brooding on the odd-job man.
He thought of mentioning this theory to Miss Willoughby, but
decided that it was too abstruse for her, and contented himself
with speaking of some of the plays he had seen before leaving
London. Miss Willoughby was an enthusiast on the drama; and,
Colonel Mant's military duties keeping him much in town, she had
had wide opportunities of indulging her tastes. Miss Willoughby
did not like the country. She thought it dull.
"Don't you think the country dull, Mr. Marson?"
"I shan't find it dull here," said Ashe; and he was surprised to
discover, through the medium of a pleased giggle, that he was
considered to have perpetrated a compliment.
Mr. Beach appeared in due season, a little distrait, as becomes a
man who has just been engaged on important and responsible
duties.
"Alfred spilled the hock!" Ashe heard him announce to Mrs.
Twemlow in a bitter undertone. "Within half an inch of his
lordship's arm he spilled it."
Mrs. Twemlow murmured condolences. Mr. Beach's set expression was
of one who is wondering how long the strain of existence can be
supported.
"Mr. Beach, if you please, dinner is served."
The butler crushed down sad thoughts and crooked his elbow.
"Mrs. Twemlow!"
Ashe, miscalculating degrees of rank in spite of all his caution,
was within a step of leaving the room out of his proper turn; but
the startled pressure of Miss Willoughby's hand on his arm warned
him in time. He stopped, to allow the statuesque Miss Chester to
sail out under escort of a wizened little man with a horseshoe
pin in his tie, whose name, in company with nearly all the others
that had been spoken to him since he came into the room, had
escaped Ashe's memory.
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