The Argosy — page 171: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

156 A Glove’s Evidence. my morning dresses? In fact do all that a /ady’s lady’s maid should do?” “To the best of my belief, madam, I can do all this.” ‘You must always say ‘my lady’ when you speak to me.” “YES, 7. 2, ue ey ei “Put back your hood, take off your hat, and let me have a look at you.” The girl obeyed. Lady Jakes, looking scrutinizingly at the sweet face blushing beneath her bold inspection, remarked that the large grey eyes met hers without flinching, and thet the classically-shaped head, round which the smooth brown hair was simply coiled, carried itself as proudly as a queen’s. “You'll do,” said the lady shortly with a nod. ‘‘I engage you for a month on trial at twenty pounds a year. As this is Saturday and I am terribly in want of a maid, you had best remain. I will send for your things, wherever they may be, to-night.” Preliminaries being thus quickly settled, Margaret Johnson turned over a fresh page in her history and began her new life in the charac- ter of a lady’s maid. Lady Jakes was the daughter of a rich country brewer. A year before this story opens she married an old city knight, whom good living in general and port wine in particular killed a few months after marriage. During the prescribed period of her mourning, Lady Jakes elected to live in the house left her by her father—the large stone house with the lodge and iron gates in the county town where she was. born. She brought a large retinue from London—among them the dishonest lady’s maid, whose place she hoped now she had efficiently supplied. The new maid, however, had not been many days in Lady Jakes’s service before it became painfully evident to the latter that there was more of the lady about Margaret Johnson than about Lady Jakes her- self. This knowledge gave rise to an uncomfortable feeling which her ladyship in vain tried to dispel. At first she resented the fact, but ultimately determined to turn it to account. It is true the country brewer’s daughter had received a fair enough education at a large school, but it was somewhat humiliating to find that the daily com- panionship of a refined girl like Margaret Johnson opened out a new branch of learning. It showed her her own deficiencies. She knew herself to be loud, abrupt in speech, quick and gauche in manner. Her maid, on the other hand, spoke slowly, softly, with few words ; but those she used were spoken ina low, sweet, melodious voice. Her movements were the embodiment of grace. Her dresses—rigorously plain—were of some soft black stuff that clung closely to her figure, with the narrowest rim of white at throat and wrists. She was in mourning for her father, who had died a few months back, she said 3 but on all matters referring to herself or her antecedents the girl was reticent in the extreme. COMIC OOOKS. COR