believe we're on the right tack," she said. "Could she have received Lady Deal's butler's message, do you think? What's your number?"
"Tilling 76," said Miss Mackintosh.
Evie gave three ecstatic little squeaks.
"Oh, that's it, that's it!" she said. "Elizabeth Mapp is Tilling 67. So careless of them, but all quite plain. And she did hear it from somebody in London. Quite true, and so dreadfully false and misleading, and so like her. Isn't it, Diva? Well, it does serve her right to be found out."
Miss Mackintosh was evidently a true Tillingite.
"How marvellous!" she said. "Tell me much more about Miss Mapp. But let's go back. Why did she take that card away?"
Diva looked at Evie, and Evie looked at Diva.
"You tell her," said Evie.
"Well, it was like this," said Diva. "Let us suppose that she heard the butler say that Lady Deal was coming —"
"And passed it on," interrupted Miss Mackintosh. "Because Susie got the message and said it was wonderfully clear for a trunk call. That explains it. Please go on."
"And so Elizabeth Mapp called," said Diva, "and left her card. I didn't know that until you told me just now. And now I come in. I met her that very afternoon, and she told me that Lady Deal, so she had heard in London, had taken this house. So we looked up Lady Deal in a very old Peerage of hers —"
Miss Mackintosh waved her arms wildly.
"Oh, please stop, and let me guess," she cried. "I shall go crazy with joy if I'm right. It was an old Peerage, and so she found that Lady Deal was Helena Herman —"
"Whom she had seen ten years ago at a music hall as a male impersonator," cried Diva.
"And didn't want to know her," interrupted Miss Mackintosh.
"Yes, that's it, but that is not all. I hope you won't mind, but it's too rich. She saw you this morning coming out of your house in your bath-chair, and was quite sure that you were that Lady Deal."
The three ladies rocked with laughter. Sometimes one recovered, and sometimes two, but they were re-infected by the third, and so they went on, solo and chorus, and duet and chorus, till exhaustion set in.
"But there's still a mystery," said Diva at length, wiping her eyes. "Why did the Peerage say that Lady Deal was Helena Herman?"
"Oh, that's the last Lady Deal," said Miss Mackintosh. "Helena Herman's Lord Deal died without children and Florence's Lord Deal, my Lady Deal, succeeded. Cousins."
"If that isn't a lesson for Elizabeth Mapp," said Diva. "Better go to the expense of a new Peerage than make such a muddle. But what a long call we've made. We must go."
"Florence shall hear every word of it tomorrow night," said Miss Mackintosh. "I promise not to tell her till then. We'll all tell her."
"Oh, that is kind of you," said Diva.
"It's only fair. And what about Miss Mapp being told?"
"She'll find it out by degrees," said the ruthless Diva. "It will hurt more in bits."
"Oh, but she mustn't be hurt," said Miss Mackintosh. "She's too precious, I adore her."
"So do we," said Diva. "But we like her to be found out occasionally. You will, too, when you know her."
Desirable Residences
HOUSES in Tilling are in much request during the months of August and September by holiday-makers of the quieter sort, who do not want to stay in large hotels on esplanades in places where there are piers, to flock to the shore in brilliant bathing-costumes, to pose for photographers in the certainty of winning prizes as plump sea-nymphs, to dress for dinner and dance afterwards. But families in search of tranquillity combined with agreeable pastimes, find Tilling much to their mind: there is a golf-links, there are illimitable sands and safe bathing: no treacherous currents swirl the swimmer out to sea when the tide is ebbing (indeed, the shore is so flat that the ebb merely leaves him stranded like a star-fish miles away from his clothes): there are stretches of charming country inland for exploratory picnics, and Tilling itself is so full of picturesque corners and crooked chimneys and timbered houses that easels in August render the streets almost impassable.
The higher social circles in this little town are mainly composed of well-to-do maiden ladies and widows, most of whom, owing to the remunerative demand for holiday residences, live in rather larger houses than they otherwise would and recoup themselves by advantageous letting. Thus towards the middle of July a very lively general post takes place.
Those who own the largest houses with gardens, like Miss Elizabeth Mapp, can let them for as much as fifteen guineas a week, and themselves take houses for that period at eight to ten guineas at week, thus collaring the difference and enjoying a change of habitation, which often gives them rich peeps into the private habits of their neighbours. Those who have smaller houses, like Mrs Plaistow, similarly let them for perhaps eight guineas a week and take something at five: the owners of the latter take cottages, and the cottagers go hop-picking.
Many householders, of course, go away for these months, but those who remain always let their own houses and are content with something smaller. The system seems to resemble that of those thrifty villagers who earned their living by taking in each other's washing, and answers excellently.
Miss Mapp on this moming of early July had received an enquiry from her last year's tenants, as to whether she would let her house to them again on the same terms. They were admirable tenants who brought their own servants, a father who played golf, a mother who wrote letters in the garden, and two daughters with spectacles who steadily sketched their way along the streets of the town.
Miss Mapp instantly made up her mind to do so, and had to settle whether she should take a smaller house herself or go away. If she could get Diva Plaistow's house, she thought she would remain here and take her holiday in the winter. Diva was asking eight guineas a week, including garden-produce. The crop on her apple-trees this year was prodigious, and since garden-produce was included, Miss Mapp supposed she would have the right to fill hampers with what she couldn’t eat and take them away at the end of her tenancy.
"I shouldn't have to buy an apple all winter," thought Miss Mapp. "And then fifteen guineas a week for eight weeks makes a hundred and twenty guineas, and subtract eight times eight which is sixty-four (I shall try to get it a little cheaper) which leaves — let me see . . ."
She arrived at the sumptuous remainder by tracing figures with the handle of her teaspoon on the table-cloth, and having written to the admirable tenants to say that she would be happy to let her house again at the same price, hurried to the house-agents to make enquiries. She could, of course, have gone to Diva direct, but it would not be pretty to haggle in person with so old a friend. She put on her most genial smile, and was artful.
"Good-morning, Mr Hassall," she said. "A cousin has asked me to enquire about houses in Tilling for the summer. I think Mrs Plaistow’s little house might suit her, but I fancy she wouldn't pay as much as eight guineas a week."
"Very
