E. F. Benson

“ People came rather late in to lunch that day; in fact there was hardly anyone there except Jessica and deaf Mrs. Antrobus till that meretricious hubbub from the lounge ceased. Directly Jessica had finished she tripped away to the piano and had a real good practice. Long before she finished, her fingers were aching, but she held on till four o'clock, at which hour she usually had tea.
She had hardly left the lounge when Mrs. Leader entered it from the garden-door. The piano-stool was rather low, and she sat on all Jessica's volumes of Beethoven.... ”

“ Innes, you and I play bridge together to-night, I think. We really must secure a table away from the piano, or I am sure I shall revoke.... Dear padre, going to have a round at putting? I wonder—you have such tact—if you could tell Mrs. Leader that we are very serious bridge-ites. Oh, dear me, there she is at it again."
Brilliant and rollicking strains came from the window of the lounge, and Jessica, protesting that she could not read her paper in that riot, retired to the sunless little garden on the other side of the hotel. ”

“ Leader: now I shall enjoy seeing a match between you two."
Mr. Leader was a very different person from the padre. He was a gruff, unsociable sort of man, who had been known to refuse to go out of the lounge while they thought of a word, and once when he did go, he went to the smoking-room (for Jessica discouraged smoking in the hall) and refused to come back. ”

“ This was a post with strategic advantages: she could drop bright little words of encouragement to anyone who was playing on the putting-course which zigzagged over the lawn, and she could also make an early inspection of any arrivals by the train from London which was due about this time. If the weather was inclement she took her tea in the hall and observed them from there as they passed through to see their rooms. As soon as they had gone she looked at the names they had signed in the visitors' book. ”

“ The longest-living author of this work died in 1940, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 83 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works. ”