"I’ve just left a note for you," he said, affecting carelessness. "I brought it down myself because I couldn’t remember whether your number was 56 or 65, and I had to inquire. Moreover, it’s urgent. I want to talk to you. Will you dine with me to-night at the Devonshire Restaurant, Jermyn Street? Eight o’clock. I shan’t be able to dress, so you could wear a hat. Yes or no?..." He was gone again in a moment.
Lilian literally ran upstairs to her room in order to be alone with her ecstatic happiness. She hugged it, kissed it, smothered it; then read the wonderful note three times, and reviewed all her new clothes.
As Lilian armed herself for the field she discovered that, after all her care, she had omitted to provide several small details, the absence of each of which seemed for a few moments in turn to be a disaster. But on the whole she was well satisfied with the total effectiveness. The slattern, who had been furtively summoned, and who was made to wash her hands before touching a hook-and-eye, expressed, in whispers, an admiring amazement which enheartened Lilian in spite of its uninformed quality. The girl, as if bewitched, followed the vision down to the front door.
"If it rains you’re ruined, miss," said the girl anxiously, glancing up into the heavy darkness where not a star was to be seen. "You ought for to have an umbrella."
"It won’t rain," she answered cheerfully.
But as soon as she was fairly away from the house she felt, or thought she felt, a drop of rain, and, seeing a taxi, she impulsively hailed it, wishing to heaven the next instant that she had not been so audacious. For although twice with her father and mother she had ridden in taxis on very great occasions, she had never in her life actually taken one by herself. Her voice failed and broke as she said to the driver: "Devonshire Restaurant, Jermyn Street"; but the driver was proficient in comprehension, and the Devonshire Restaurant in Jermyn Street seemed to be as familiar to him as Charing Cross Station.
In the taxi she collected herself. She thought she was all right except for her lips. She knew that her lips ought to have been slightly coloured, but she thought she also knew what was the best lip-stick and she had not been able to get it in Hammersmith. As for her nails, she was glad that it had been impossible for her to tint them. She must remember that she was a typist, and though typists, and even discharged typists, generally help their lips to be crimson on state-nights, they do not usually tint their nails--unless they have abandoned discretion.