"Why, Lady Tepping," I answered, in perfect innocence. "She has a fancy
for these things, you know. She brought a lot of them home with her from
Burma."
As a matter of fact, as I have already explained, my poor dear aunt is
an extremely commonplace old Army widow, whose husband happened to get
knighted among the New Year's honours for some brush with the natives on
the Shan frontier. But Lady Meadowcroft was at the stage where a title
is a title; and the discovery that I was the nephew of a "titled person"
evidently interested her. I could feel rather than see that she glanced
significantly aside at Sir Ivor, and that Sir Ivor in return made a
little movement of his shoulders equivalent to "I told you so."
Now Hilda knew perfectly well that the aunt of whom I spoke WAS
Lady Tepping; so I felt sure that she had played this card of malice
prepense, to pique Lady Meadowcroft.
But Lady Meadowcroft herself seized the occasion with inartistic
avidity. She had hardly addressed us as yet. At the sound of the magic
passport, she pricked up her ears, and turned to me suddenly. "Burma?"
she said, as if to conceal the true reason for her change of front.
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