.
When the season of week-ends came round each year, she was the
proudest of women in the country-side. At that very moment, she was
wearing a silk petticoat, worth its weight in gold, five guineas at
the utmost for it seemed like froth in the hand--which a French lady's
maid had given her in exchange for silence over a little incident
that scarcely calls for mention. The first return of her mistress
to Apsley, then, was a sign of the nearing season--the lonely swallow
that is seen scudding through the first break in the year by some
enthusiastic ornithologist and recorded in the next morning's
edition of the _Times_. She kept a diary, in fact, did Mrs. Butterick,
and in about the middle of April of every year, might be noticed the
comment, "Madame arrived--first time this year--" and then, more
than probably the addition, "House-party on the ----" and thereafter
the date, whatever it may have been.

Now, on this occasion, as she always did, she beamed in silence and
waited.

"Good morning, Mrs. Butterick. You got my letter?"

"Yes, madam."

"These sheets are aired?"

"Dry as a bone, madam. I felt 'em myself."

"I shall only be staying the night," Mrs. Durlacher continued; "I
go back to Town to-morrow morning."

Mrs. Butterick made no reply, If her features could have fallen into
an expression of disappointment, they would willingly have done so;
but nature had taken no trouble with them. They were an afterthought.
It seemed as if they had been placed there at the last moment of birth,
with no inner mechanism to answer to sensation. She just said
nothing.

"To-morrow morning," Mrs. Durlacher repeated.

"Yes, madam."

"And now you can take the chintz covers off everything in this room
and the drawing-room as well. There's rather a snap in the air; I
think perhaps you might have the fire lighted in the dining-room.
And tell one of the gardeners to pick me plenty of daffodils--not
common ones--not those ordinary double ones, but the best he's got.
White petals with the yellow trumpets--you know the ones I mean. Also
some narcissi and a few tulips--pink ones for the drawing-room. They
must all be on the dining-room table when I come downstairs. I'll
arrange them myself. And get my trunks sent up to me at once--I want
to change my dress. Taylor and Mason are coming down by train; they'll
be here any minute now. The trap went for them--didn't it?"

"Yes, madam--at half-past ten."

"Well, then, that's all, Mr