Meeting her face to face, her pale,
slightly puckered cheeks, closely compressed lips, keen light eyes, and
crisp pepper-and-salt hair--Cayenne pepper, for it had once been
red--suggested at least twenty or twenty-five additional years as
compared with the back view.
Returning to her seat, she began to tat, slowing drawing each knot home
with a reflective air.
"That woman is hunting her up," she exclaimed suddenly, after a few
minutes' silence, during which Bertie looked thoughtfully at the
fire--his quiet face, with its look of unutterable peace, the strongest
possible contrast to his sister's hard, shrewd aspect.
"What woman?" asked, as if recalled from a dream.
"Mrs. Ormonde. There was a telegram from her this afternoon. She has
been worrying Miss Liddell to go to them ever since she set foot in
England; and as that won't do, she is coming up to-morrow to see what
personal persuasion will do."
"I dare say Mrs. Ormonde is fond of her sister-in-law. She is too well
off to have any mercenary designs."
"Is that all your experience has taught you?" (contemptuously). "If
there is any truth in hand-writing, that Mrs. Ormonde is a fool. Her
letter after Mrs. Liddell's death, which Katherine showed me because it
touched her, was the production of an effusive idiot.
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