Page:What Maisie Knew (Chicago & New York, Herbert S. Stone & Co., 1897).djvu/129

question Mrs. Wix on this subject, she elicited the remarkable reply: "Well, my dear, it's her ladyship's game; and we must just hold on like grim death." Maisie, at her leisure, could interpret these ominous words. Her reflections indeed at this moment thickened apace, and one of them made her sure that her governess had conversations, private, earnest and not infrequent, with her frivolous stepfather. She perceived in the light of a second episode that something beyond her knowledge had taken place in the house. The things beyond her knowledge—numerous enough in truth—had not hitherto, she believed, been the things that were nearest to her; she had even had in the past a small, snug conviction that in the domestic labyrinth she always kept the clew. This time too, however, she at last found out; with the discreet aid, it had to be confessed, of Mrs. Wix. Sir Claude's own assistance was abruptly taken from her for his comment on her ladyship's game was to start on the spot, quite alone, for Paris; evidently because he wished to show a spirit when accused of positive wickedness. He might be fond of his stepdaughter, Maisie felt, without wishing her to be, after all, thrust on him in such a way.