His rough,
pumpkin-coloured front feet hung genteelly limp, and his tail slowly
described a half circle on the highly polished floor.
Brigit laughed again, and patted his head. "Does he expect an answer?"
she asked seriously; but before the dog could tell her what he thought
the door opened, and Madame Joyselle entered, bearing a small lacquered
tray, on which stood a tiny coffee-pot, cup and saucer, plate and
cream-jug, of gleaming white porcelain, the edges of which glittered in
a narrow gold line, and a tall glass vase containing a very large and
faultless gardenia.
"I have brought you your coffee, Lady Brigit," said the little woman,
showing her beautiful teeth in a cheery smile, "and 'ard-boiled eggs.
Theo told me you like them 'ard-boiled. The gardenia is from my
'usband."
Her English was very bad, and the unusual exertion of speaking in the
tongue which to her, in spite of twenty-five years' residence in the
country of its birth, still remained "foreign," brought a pretty flush
to her brown cheeks. "You sleep--well?"
As she ate her breakfast Lady Brigit studied this simple woman who was
to be her mother-in-law. Madame Joyselle was, socially speaking,
absolutely unpresentable, for she had remained in every respect except
that of age what she had been born--a Norman peasant.
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