girl angrily. Then, turning to
me: "Are there crowds of other people here already?"

"Yes, Miss," I answered demurely. But I felt a sudden warm sympathy with
the two young things in the hall. We had, I suspected, the same kind of
voice, the same carriage of the head, we had had the same sort of
clothes.

We'd been "raised," as Mr. Jessop puts it, with much the same outlook.
We had a class in common, the class of the nouveaux-pauvres! Our eyes
flashed understanding as they met.

Then the younger girl exclaimed: "Wait a minute. I _must_ finish
laughing before we go in!"

And she stood for a full minute, quivering and swaying and rocking with
perfectly silent mirth. Then she pulled herself together and said
gravely:

"Right. I've finished now. Say the Miss Owens, please."

I rather wanted to have a good silent laugh to myself as I solemnly
announced the two girls.

They came, I afterwards gleaned, from the long white house that faces us
across the valley. Who the other people were who were filling the
chintz-covered couch and easy-chairs in the drawing-room I didn't
gather.

I haven't "disentangled" the different hats and faces and voices and
costumes; I suppose I shall do so in due course, and shall be able to
give a clear description of each one of these callers "from the
neighbourhood" upon Miss Million. I knew she would be an object of
curiosity to any neighbourhood to which she came!

And I wonder how many of these people know that she is one of the
heroines of the Rattenheimer ruby case, that hangs over our heads like a
veritable sword of Damocles the whole time!

But to get on to the principal excitement of the afternoon--the utterly
unlooked-for surprise that awaited me in the kitchen!

The typically Welsh kitchen in this newly acquired place of Miss
Million's is to me the nicest room in the house.

I love its spaciousness and its slate floor, and the ponderous oak beams
that bisect its smoke-blackened ceiling and are hung with bunches of
dried herbs and with hams.

I love its dresser, full of willow-pattern china, and its two big china
dogs that face each other on the high mantelpiece.

The row of bright brass candlesticks appeals to me, and the
grandfather's clock, with the sun, moon, and stars on its face, and the
smooth-scrubbed white deal kitchen-table pitted with tiny worm-holes,
and the plants in the window, and everything about it.

Miss Million declares she never saw such a kitchen "in