kitchen-garden kingdom; but she would be far more attractive now if only
she had "abdicated," as nice middle-aged women say in France.

Her dress was the very latest dream of a neurotic Parisian modiste, and
would have been seductive on a slender girl. On her--well, at least she
would have her wish in it--she would not pass unnoticed!

She looked surprised at sight of me, and I saw she didn't realize that I
was the expected candidate.

"Lady Kilmarny couldn't come," I began to explain, "and--"

"Oh!" she cut me short. "So you are the young person she is recommending
as a maid."

I corrected Miss Paget when she called me a "young woman," but times
have changed since then, and in future I must humbly consent to be a
young person, or even a creature.

For a minute I forgot, and almost sat down. It would have been the end
of me if I had! Luckily I remembered What I was, and stood before my
mistress, trying to look like Patience on a monument with butter in her
mouth which mustn't be allowed to melt.

"What is your name?" began the catechism (and the word was "nime,"
according to Lady Turnour).

"N or M," nearly slipped out of my mouth, but I put Satan with all his
mischief behind me, and answered that I was Lys d'Angely.