The Importance of Being Ernestine Read Online Free PDF Page A

to speak up was lost.
    â€œHorrible stuff we see in this business.” Mrs. M. looked positively blissful. “Still, no disrespect to Milk, some jobs in this business are best left to women is what I say. Can’t expect a man to really understand the female viewpoint, now can you?”
    â€œYou may be right.” Her ladyship’s eyelids narrowed. “Even my dear Horace was not always sensitive to my way of looking at things. Indeed, part of my reason for being late for my appointment was that I lost track of time wondering if Mr. Jugg would dismiss my fears as flights of feminine fantasy.”
    â€œThere you are, then!” Mrs. Malloy was at her most triumphant. “All turned out for the best, didn’t it? How about I fix you a good stiff drink before we get started? And don’t be afraid to go ahead and smoke if you fancy a ciggy. Mrs. Haskell and me aren’t ones to pass judgment. Would be the pot calling the kettle black, wouldn’t it?”
    It was all too much for me. Prying myself away from the desk I fled in what I hoped was the direction of the loo, somehow in the process managing to drag Mrs. Malloy along with me. She mumbled something over her shoulder, and I caught a glimpse of Her Ladyship’s startled black gaze before I found myself again hanging over the washbasin. Oh, the blessed chill of the porcelain! For a moment I prayed for the guillotine to come slicing down on my neck, and then all at once—miraculously—I was whole and healthy again. Amazing! The floor didn’t tilt. The room didn’t spin. And even Mrs. Malloy’s aggrieved voice did not make me wish to take a nosedive into the toilet and be flushed away into oblivion.
    â€œWell, I hope you’re proper ashamed of yourself, Mrs. H., giving that poor little old lady the silent treatment.”
    â€œI didn’t feel well.”
    â€œRubbish! You look proper blooming to me this minute. Never been so shown up in me life, I haven’t! And after me going and promoting you too! Anyone else would have made you the secretary and me Mr. Jugg’s partner. Unselfish to the core, that’s always been me trouble. But there’s no use standing here crying over spilt milk.”
    I didn’t ask if there was any pun intended. “Lady Krumley isn’t little,” I said. She has to be five foot eight in her bare feet. And I doubt very much given the title that she’s poor.”
    â€œThere you go, picking me words apart like a sink full of lettuce! We’ve got to get back in there before she gets the wind up and disappears into the night.” Mrs. Malloy stood like Justice on a pedestal, but I turned to straighten my hair in the dinky little mirror above the basin, feeling stronger by the minute. There was no way I was going to allow her to intimidate me into posing as a private detective—something I was sure would have nasty legal consequences. One petty criminal in the family was enough, thank you very much.
    My cousin Freddy’s mother, Aunt Lulu, had taken up shoplifting years ago when her women friends chose needle-point or bridge as a hobby. To date she had not found herself in the dock facing a judge wearing a wig his wife had crocheted and who was not inclined to be moved by the fact that the accused claimed to give most of her “finds,” as she termed them, to charitable organizations.
    â€œSo her ladyship’s a tough-looking old bird living in a house with four hundred rooms—from the address I peeked at in Mr. Jugg’s appointment book.” Mrs. Malloy’s blonde hair sat on her head like an ill-fitting halo. “Moldy Towers, I think that’s the name of the place.”
    â€œSurely not!”
    â€œI’m not here to argue with you, Mrs. H.” Amazingly, Mrs. Malloy’s nose did not grow with this brazen lie. “The point I’m making is that Lady Krumley wouldn’t be here if she wasn’t in