anxiety which
the answer displayed.

"I guess, if you don't mind, Miss Ramsden had better lie right-down for
a spell. She's had some brandy, and a cup of tea would be pretty
comforting, but it's rest she needs most of all. It's a pretty hard
strain sitting by, and watching someone else driving straight to glory.
When you've got something to do, there's not so much time to think. The
spill was bound to come, so it was up to me to choose the softest
place!"

Mrs Greville stared, in obvious disregard of the meaning of the words.

"Why, you are American! How odd! I've never met an American in Norton
before, in all the years I have lived here!"

"I'm not a mite surprised!" replied Cornelia, with a depth of meaning
which her hearers failed to fathom. They imagined that she was humbly
appreciative of her own good fortune in visiting a neighbourhood as yet
preserved from the desecration of the American tourists, whereas she was
mentally reviewing the sleepy shops where the assistants took a solid
five minutes to procure twopence change, the broken-down flies which
crawled to and from the station; the tortoise-like round of village
life.

"If Providence had sent over half a dozen more like me a dozen years
ago, there's no saying but they might be rubbing their knuckles into
their eyes by now, and beginning to wake up! I've got to butt right in,
if I'm to make any mark by the end of three months!"

Such were the young woman's mental reflections, while Geoffrey rang the
bell and anticipated his mother's order for tea. He was anxious that
Elma should lie down then and there, but she refused to do so, with a
glance from the delicate cushions to her own dusty boots. Cornelia's
openly expressed solicitude had had the not unnatural result of
increasing her feeling of exhaustion, and the colour flamed and faded in
her cheeks as she endeavoured to drink tea and take part in the
conversation which ensued. Mother and son watched her continuously, the
one with unconcealed anxiety, the other with a wholly impersonal
admiration, as though the girl were a new article of furniture, which
fitted unusually well into its niche. Her air was kindly enough, but
too dispassionate to be sympathetic. Elma Ramsden hardly counted as an
independent human being in the estimation of Madame Greville, but she
was a lovely piece of flesh and blood, at whom it was pleasant to look.
It would be a thousand pities if her beauty were marred. It w