Fielden nodded obediently, and his head slid back around the door.
The woman chuckled. Maisie couldn’t understand her ease. If she had been caught lounging on an office floor—not that she would ever contemplate such an action—she’d be lucky to retrieve her hat and coat before being shown the door. But this woman took a luxurious sip of tea, set her cup on a lacquered tray, and swung to her feet with an almost acrobatic leap.
“Now, then, what were you delivering?”
“Er . . .” Maisie bent to gather the papers, now far beyond hopeless and well into disaster.
Why didn’t I just look for work picking potatoes?
The woman helped her up, and Maisie balanced the papers on the desk.
“Are you . . . ? I, er, I thought the director of Talks didn’t have a secretary,” Maisie said, her hands still shifting through the papers to hide their trembling.
“Not as such, no, and that’s something that badly needs rectifying,” came the jaunty reply. Maisie had the uneasy sense of being read from the inside out, despite the placid sweetness of the huge blue eyes. The woman was rather lovely, with soft blond hair cut into a wavy bob and an elegant figure shown to advantage in a practical, and obviously bespoke, tweed suit. Her skin was the pink and white of first bloom, but Maisie felt sure she was in her thirties. It was just something about her bearing. This was a woman who had seen and done things.
And now she had seen the interoffice envelope, addressed to the director of Talks.
“Ah!” she cried, catching it up and opening it.
Maisie was galvanized. “No! That’s for Mr. Matheson, Miss Shields said.”
“I know of two Mr. Mathesons, and neither are here.” The woman grinned. She had the air of an infinitely patient teacher.
Maisie had the horrible sense she was being set up for a joke. That any second, Cyril, Beanie, Rusty, and the boys were going to swarm around the door and laugh at her. That the story would fly through the whole of Savoy Hill and follow her wherever she ran, even if she fled to deepest Saskatchewan.
“You . . . Are you . . . the director of Talks?” Maisie whispered, hoping everyone waiting to laugh wouldn’t hear.
“I am,” the woman announced with a pleased nod. “Hilda Matheson. Miss. And you are?”
“Maisie Musgrave.”
“Aha!” Hilda pumped Maisie’s hand, her eyes snapping with delight. “My new secretary! Or as much as Mr. Reith and Miss Shields are willing to spare you. Thus far. Marvelous! Now, don’t you mind me sitting on the floor by the fire. It’s a grand way to think and just one of my quirks.”
“I didn’t mean to—”
“You most certainly did, and don’t you apologize for it. It was glorious.” Hilda laughed. Her musical laugh was very unlike Beanie’s. It was boisterous, rolling, and deep—Maisie found it a touch alarming.
“I expect you thought I was a secretary,” she went on, not waiting for Maisie’s embarrassed nod. “Wouldn’t I get into the hottest water for such impropriety? Well,” she added, eyes twinkling with an unsettling roguishness, “I might anyway at that. But it is chilly and one must stay warm. I appreciate your looking after me, Miss Musgrave, though I might suggest in future moderating your tone just a nip.”
Maisie could hear an echo of that laugh.
“Of course, Miss Matheson,” she whispered.
“That’s going to the other extreme. But quite all right. It’s always useful to try a few possibilities. Else how can you be sure what’s right?”
“I . . . I don’t know, Miss Matheson.”
“Well, we try, try again. Now, are all these for Talks as well?” she asked, indicating the folders.
“Er, yes, but I’m afraid . . .” Maisie squeezed her eyes shut, both to avoid seeing this exacting woman too closely and to stop the tears from spilling more freely than the papers. “Oh, Miss Matheson, I’m so sorry, but I’d already dropped them, even before now. They’ve got to be put all back together and I don’t know—”
“Folders dropped twice, and on your first morning, no less! That is a feat. You don’t make a habit of tossing paper thither and yon, do you?”
“Oh, no! No, I was . . . Well, I ran into a tuba.”
“Occupational hazard in Savoy Hill. But you’re all right? Good. Now, let’s have at these papers and see how quickly they submit to order.”