"The dear countess!" said Mrs. Gibson, with soft affection. It was
a soliloquy, uttered after a minute's pause, at the end of all this
information.
And all the rest of that day her conversation had an aristocratic
perfume hanging about it. One of the few books she had brought with
her into Mr. Gibson's house was bound in pink, and in it she studied
"Menteith, Duke of, Adolphus George," &c., &c., till she was fully up
in all the duchess's connections, and probable interests. Mr. Gibson
made his mouth up into a droll whistle when he came home at night,
and found himself in a Towers' atmosphere. Molly saw the shade
of annoyance through the drollery; she was beginning to see it
oftener than she liked, not that she reasoned upon it, or that she
consciously traced the annoyance to its source; but she could not
help feeling uneasy in herself when she knew her father was in the
least put out.
Of course a fly was ordered for Mrs. Gibson. In the early afternoon
she came home. If she had been disappointed in her interview with
the countess she never told her woe, nor revealed the fact that when
she first arrived at the Towers she had to wait for an hour in Lady
Cumnor's morning-room, uncheered by any companionship save that of
her old friend, Mrs. Bradley, till suddenly, Lady Harriet coming in,
she exclaimed, "Why, Clare! you dear woman! are you here all alone?
Does mamma know?" And, after a little more affectionate conversation,
she rushed to find her ladyship, who was perfectly aware of the fact,
but too deep in giving the duchess the benefit of her wisdom and
experience in trousseaux to be at all aware of the length of time
Mrs. Gibson had been passing in patient solitude. At lunch Mrs.
Gibson was secretly hurt by my lord's supposing it to be her dinner,
and calling out his urgent hospitality from the very bottom of the
table, giving as a reason for it, that she must remember it was her
dinner. In vain she piped out in her soft, high voice, "Oh, my lord!
I never eat meat in the middle of the day; I can hardly eat anything
at lunch." Her voice was lost, and the duchess might go away with the
idea that the Hollingford doctor's wife dined early; that is to say,
if her grace ever condescended to have any idea on the subject at
all; which presupposes that she was cognizant of the fact of there
being a doctor at Hollingford, and that he had a wife, and that his
wife was the pretty, faded, elegant-looking woman sending away her
plate of untasted food--food which she longed to eat, for she was
really desperately hungry after her drive and her solitude.