The Marriage Wheel by Susan Barrie

lunch the following day, and Lestrode took his place in the back a bare minute or so later.
    She was not surprised that he sat in the back, for except on the occasion when her mother and her sister had been passengers also he seemed to prefer the isolation and dignity of the back seat. No doubt, she thought, it afforded him some satisfaction to contemplate her back rather than her profile, for she was after all his paid servant, and there was less necessity to address an occasional remark to her than there would have been if he had sat beside her in the front of the car.
    Even so, he did occasionally give her a few instructions, which caused her to remember his existence; but he was no back-seat driver, and her nerves were not harrowed by hearing him offer a sharp piece of advice so suddenly that she would almost certainly have taken the wrong turning, or lost control of the wheel. That, of course, would have been fatal, and no doubt he realised it.
    The house where he was to have lunch was quite a famous one in the county, and Frederica was looking forward to seeing it for the first time. The thing she was not looking forward to was having her own lunch with the members of her employer ’ s host ’ s staff in the domestic premises of the house, and this had nothing to do with snobbishness, but was entirely due to the fear she had that she herself would be looked upon as rather an oddity.
    Even in this enlightened day and age domestics are pretty much domestics, and she wasn ’ t even a female domestic—she was a chauffeuse; and she was perfectly well aware that she didn ’ t look the part.
    For the occasion she had donned one of her smart new dresses, and as she sat behind the wheel she looked sufficiently attractive to merit more than one casual glance on the short journey to the dignified Georgian mansion where she was to deposit Lestrode. He was smiling as she set him down, and the smile seemed to flicker over her as he waved a casual hand.
    “ I shall probably be leaving about three o ’ clock. I ’ m sure they ’ ll fix you up with lunch somewhere in the kitchen regions, but don ’ t start a flirtation with the butler, will you? It wouldn ’ t be quite fair as he ’ s probably very elderly, anyway! ”
    Frederica tightened her lips and kept her eyes rigidly averted as he climbed the steps to the house. Then she made up her mind to do something which might have repercussions later, since the staff would almost certainly report on it, and drove off down the drive again in the direction of the village. There, as there was no inn of modest appearance where she might have bought herself a frugal lunch, she went inside the post-office which was also the general store and bought some chocolate and apples, and sat on the edge of a wood a couple of miles away to munch them.
    It was very peaceful in the wood, and she enjoyed herself far more than she would have done in a servant ’ s hall echoing with chatter about the elevated human beings who were being regaled with first-class fare in the dining-room. But it was also a very warm day, and even with the windows open it was very warm against the leather upholstery of the car. She got out and walked about for a bit, and then as the car was perfectly safe, and it was a third-class road she was on, anyway, and probably very little used, she decided to penetrate the trees to a sylvan spot smelling deliciously of pine needles and other aromatic scents, and stretched herself out on a soft bed of turf and went to sleep.
    Never in her life had she gone to sleep quite so rapidly—certainly without the least intention of doing anything of the kind—and the shock the process of waking up caused her was like the shock of waking to an alarm bell. She sprang up, dusted down the front of her dress and glanced at her wrist-watch in horror. It was ten minutes past three!
    An anguished cry left her lips as she hurled herself back into the car. Fortunately it was only a bare couple of