Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson Read Free Book Online

expressions. I assure you, fashions change in words, same as everything else. I think they’ve quite come out of the sinful category now. There now, what you need is another drink.”
    She went over to the tray and further depleted the sherry bottle. She came back with a brimming glass.
    “Come along now. It’s only sherry. I know you like your drinks light in a morning.”
    Miss Pettigrew looked up. Her tears began to dry. Her face took on a look of dawning wonder and remembrance.
    “Oh!” gasped Miss Pettigrew. “Oh, I did. I dealt with a situation.”
    “Oh boy!” said Miss LaFosse with reverence. “You sure did.”
    Miss Pettigrew’s eyes began to shine through her tears. She was tremulous, bewildered, unbelieving.
    “I did. I saved it.”
    “Oh, quick,” hurried Miss LaFosse. “Drink your sherry, and tell me how you did it.”
    Miss Pettigrew refused it.
    “No, thank you, my dear. I have had two already and a little I pretended to drink. It’s a wise woman who knows her limit. I have never been rendered ridiculous by alcohol yet and I have no intention of starting now.”
    “You’re sure you’re all right then?”
    “Quite.”
    Miss LaFosse swallowed the sherry herself and sat down.
    “Oh, quick,” she implored. “Quick. I can’t wait to hear any longer. How…Did…You…Do…It? I forgot the kitchen. I never thought about the kitchen. I never looked for any signs there. Rank carelessness. I was born careless. You were marvellous.”
    Miss Pettigrew made a hasty disclaimer of any brilliance.
    “It was very simple,” she said earnestly, “very simple indeed. Nothing really to it. Please don’t think I’m clever or you’ll be disappointed. When I was tidying the bedroom I discovered the packet and I thought my bag was the safest place for it. When Nick came in so angry I remembered and the rest all followed. There was nothing to it, really.”
    “Nothing to it!” said Miss LaFosse. “Nothing to it! It was brilliant, marvellous. The best bit of acting I’ve seen in years.”
    “Oh no! It wasn’t acting. It was copying.”
    “Copying?”
    “It was Mrs. Brummegan.”
    “Mrs. Brummegan?”
    “My late employer. If you’ll forgive me speaking ill of the absent, a dreadful woman.”
    “But I don’t quite follow,” said Miss LaFosse, bewildered.
    “I endured her two years,” said Miss Pettigrew simply. “I had to. I was in a very good position to know the effect of her personality. I did my best to emulate it.”
    There was no wool in Miss LaFosse’s brain. Her eyes shone.
    “Oh!” she breathed. “A Mimic. A born mimic. God! What a performance! I wouldn’t have said you had it in you. You were wonderful.”
    “Oh no,” denied Miss Pettigrew, deprecating, thrilled, delighted as a child.
    “You’ve never thought about entering the Profession, have you?”
    “The Profession?”
    “The stage, you know.”
    “The stage!” gasped Miss Pettigrew. “Me?”
    “There’s a great dearth of really good character actresses,” said Miss LaFosse earnestly. “You know how it is. The ones that started young, when they’re getting on and have the experience, they don’t like to be relegated to minor roles. They don’t like the old boys to say, “By Jove, I remember her when we were both young. You should have seen her then, my boy, when she played lead in ‘Kiss me, Daddy’.” No. They don’t. They like to stay young and play young leads, and when they can’t they quit. I don’t blame them. I’ll do it myself.”
    “You’re on the stage yourself?” queried Miss Pettigrew, tactfully leading the subject from her own histrionic powers.
    “Yes,” agreed Miss LaFosse, “but I’m resting just now, only I’m working while I’m resting. I didn’t want to sign a poorer contract while Phil was getting ready to back me in ‘Pile on the Pepper ‘, so I refused to sign a small contract and I’m singing just now at the Scarlet Peacock.”
    “A very odd name,” murmured Miss