Mistress Stagg's tongue went as fast as her needle: "And Deborah is
asleep! Poor soul! she's sadly changed from what she was in old England
thirteen years ago. As neat a shape as you would see in a day's journey,
with the prettiest color, and eyes as bright as those marcasite buttons!
And she saw the best of company at my Lady Squander's,--no lack there of
kisses and guineas and fine gentlemen, you may be sure! There's a deal of
change in this mortal world, and it's generally for the worse. Here,
child, you may whip this lace on Mr. Lightfoot's ruffles. I think myself
lucky, I can tell you, that there are so few women in Cato. If 'tweren't
so, I should have to go on myself; for since poor, dear, pretty Jane Day
died of the smallpox, and Oriana Jordan ran away with the rascally
Bridewell fellow that we bought to play husbands' parts, and was never
heard of more, but is supposed to have gotten clean off to Barbadoes by
favor of the master of the Lady Susan, we have been short of actresses.
But in this play there are only Marcia and Lucia. 'It is extremely
fortunate, my dear,' said I to Mirabell this very morning, 'that in this
play, which is the proper compliment to a great gentleman just taking
office, Mr. Addison should have put no more than two women.' And Mirabell
says--Don't put the lace so full, child; 'twon't go round."
"A chair is stopping at the gate," said Audrey, who sat by the window.
"There's a lady in it."
The chair was a very fine painted one, borne by two gayly dressed negroes,
and escorted by a trio of beribboned young gentlemen, prodigal of gallant
speeches, amorous sighs, and languishing glances. Mistress Stagg looked,
started up, and, without waiting to raise from the floor the armful of
delicate silk which she had dropped, was presently curtsying upon the
doorstep.
The bearers set down their load. One of the gentlemen opened the chair
door with a flourish, and the divinity, compressing her hoop, descended. A
second cavalier flung back Mistress Stagg's gate, and the third, with a
low bow, proffered his hand to conduct the fair from the gate to the
doorstep. The lady shook her head; a smiling word or two, a slight curtsy,
the wave of a painted fan, and her attendants found themselves dismissed.
She came up the path alone, slowly, with her head a little bent. Audrey,
watching her from the window, knew who she was, and her heart beat fast.
If this lady were in town, then so was he; he would not have stayed behind
at Westover. She would have left the room, but there was not time. The
mistress of the house, smiling and obsequious, fluttered in, and Evelyn
Byrd followed.