She
writes that she has discovered a niece and that she has invited her to
come out with her."
"I see- very kind of her," said Lord Warburton. "Is the young lady
interesting?"
"We hardly know more about her than you; my mother has not gone into
details. She chiefly communicates with us by means of telegrams, and
her telegrams are rather inscrutable. They say women don't know how to
write them, but my mother has thoroughly mastered the art of
condensation. 'Tired America, hot weather awful, return England with
niece, first steamer decent cabin.' That's the sort of message we
get from her- that was the last that came. But there had been
another before, which I think contained the first mention of the
niece. 'Changed hotel, very bad, impudent clerk, address here. Taken
sister's girl, died last year, go to Europe, two sisters, quite
independent.' Over that my father and I have scarcely stopped
puzzling; it seems to admit of so many interpretations."
"There's one thing very clear in it," said the old man; "she has
given the hotel-clerk a dressing."
"I'm not sure even of that, since he has driven her from the
field. We thought at first that the sister mentioned might be the
sister of the clerk; but the subsequent mention of a niece seems to
prove that the allusion is to one of my aunts.
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