across at Mrs. Tynn, turned somewhat hesitatingly to
pick her way out of the room. The housekeeper, though not half
understanding, contrived to make out that the morning coffee was not
approved of. The French mademoiselle had breakfasted with her, and, in
Mrs. Tynn's opinion, the coffee had been perfect, fit for the table of
her betters.

"Is it the coffee that you are abusing?" asked she. "What was the matter
with it?"

"Ciel! You ask what the matter with it!" returned Mademoiselle Benoite,
in her rapid tongue. "It was everything the matter with it. It was all
bad. It was drogue, I say; medicine. There!"

"Well, I'm sure!" resentfully returned the housekeeper. "Now, I happened
to make that coffee myself this morning--Tynn, he's particular in his
coffee, he is--and I put in--"

"I not care if you put in the whole canastre," vehemently interrupted
Mademoiselle Benoite. "You English know not to make coffee. All the two
years I lived in London with Madame la Duchesse, I never got one cup of
coffee that was not enough to choke me. And they used pounds of it in
the house, where they might have used ounces. Bah! You can make tea, I
not say no; but you cannot make coffee. Now, then! I want a great number
sheets of silk-paper."

"Silk-paper?" repeated Tynn, whom the item puzzled. "What's that?"

"You know not what silk-paper is!" angrily returned Mademoiselle
Benoite. "_Quelle ignorance!_" she apostrophised, not caring whether she
was understood or not. "_Elle ne connait pas ce que c'est,
papier-de-soie!_ I must have it, and a great deal of it, do you hear? It
is as common as anything--silk-paper."

"Things common in France mayn't be common with us," retorted Mrs. Tynn.
"What is it for?"

"It is for some of these articles. If I put them by without the
paper-silk round them in the cartons, they'll not keep their colour."

"Perhaps you mean silver-paper," said Mary Tynn. "Tissue-paper, I have
heard my Lady Verner call it. There's none in the house, Madmisel
Bennot."

"Madmisel Bennot" stamped her foot. "A house without silk-paper in it!
When you knew my lady was coming home!"

"I didn't know she'd bring--a host of things with her that she has
brought," was the answering shaft lanced by Mrs. Tynn.

"Don't you see that I am waiting? Will you send out for some?"

"It's not to be had in Deerham," said Mrs. Tynn. "If it must be had, one
of the men must go to Heartburg. Why won't the paper do that was over 'em
before?"