She would call after six o’clock, an hour incompatible with any social intention.  An hour when she would probably find Mrs. Majendie alone.

She rested all afternoon.  At five o’clock she fortified herself with strong tea and brandy.  Then she made an elaborate and thoughtful toilette.

At forty-five Sarah’s face was very large and horribly white.  She restored, discreetly, delicately, the vanished rose.  The beautiful, flower-like edges of her mouth were blurred.  With a thin thread of rouge she retraced the once perfect outline.  Wrinkles had drawn in the corners of the indomitable eyes, and ill-health had dulled their blue.  That saddest of all changes she repaired by hand-massage, pomade, and belladonna.  The somewhat unrefined exuberance of her figure she laced in an inimitable corset.  Next she arrayed herself in a suit of dark blue cloth, simple and severely reticent; in a white silk blouse, simpler still, sewn with innocent daisies, Maggie’s handiwork; in a hat, gay in form, austere in colour; and in gloves of immaculate whiteness.

Nobody could have possessed a more irreproachable appearance than Lady Cayley when she set out for Prior Street.

At the door she gave neither name nor card.  She announced herself as a lady who desired to see Mrs. Majendie for a moment on important business.

Kate wondered a little, and admitted her.  Ladies did call sometimes on important business, ladies who approached Mrs. Majendie on missions of charity; and these did not always give their names.

Anne was upstairs in the nursery, superintending the packing of Peggy’s little trunk.  She was taking her away to-morrow to the seaside, by Dr. Gardner’s orders.  She supposed that the nameless lady would be some earnest, beneficent person connected with a case for her Rescue Committee, who might have excellent reasons for not announcing herself by name.

And, at first, coming into the low lit drawing-room, she did not recognise her visitor.  She advanced innocently, in her perfect manner, with a charming smile and an appropriate apology.

The smile died with a sudden rigour of repulsion.  She paused before seating herself, as an intimation that the occasion was not one that could be trusted to explain itself.  Lady Cayley rose to it.

“Forgive me for calling at this unconventional hour Mrs. Majendie.”

Mrs. Majendie’s silence implied that she could not forgive her for calling at any hour.  Lady Cayley smiled inimitably.

“I wanted to find you at home.”

“You did not give me your name Lady Cayley.”

Their eyes crossed like swords before the duel.

“I didn’t, Mrs. Majendie, because I wanted to find you at home.  I can’t help being unconventional—­”

Mrs. Majendie raised her eyebrows.

“It’s my nature.”

Mrs. Majendie dropped her eyelids, as much as to say that the nature of Lady Cayley did not interest her.