This meant that three times a year, when the schools closed for their regular vacations, a general exodus took place from 24 Brutton Square, and Mrs.Lawrence was happily enabled to go away and visit her friends, leaving the conscientious Miss Bunting to look after the reduced establishment and cater for the one or two remaining boarders who were not released by regular holidays.

It was an admirable arrangement, profitable without being too exigeant.
At the end of each vacation Mrs.Lawrence always summoned Miss Bunting to her presence and ran through the list of boarders for the coming term, noting their various requirements.

She was thus occupied one afternoon towards the end of April.

The spring sunshine poured in through the windows, lending an added cheerfulness of aspect to the rooms of the tall London house that made them appear worth quite five shillings a week more than was actually charged for them, and Mrs.Lawrence smiled, well satisfied.
She was a handsome woman, still in the early forties, and the word "stylish" inevitably leaped to one's mind at the sight of her full, well-corseted figure, fashionable raiment, and carefully coiffured hair.
There was nothing whatever of the boarding-house keeper about her; in fact, at first sight, she rather gave the impression of a pleasant, sociable woman who, having a house somewhat larger than she needed for her own requirements, accepted a few paying guests to keep the rooms aired.
This was just the impression she wished to convey, and it was usually some considerable time before her boarders grasped the fact that they were dealing with, a thoroughly shrewd, calculating business woman, who was bent on making every penny out of them that she could, compatibly with running the house on such lines as would ensure its answering to the advertised description.
"I'm glad it's a sunny day," she remarked to Miss Bunting.

"First impressions are everything, and that pupil of Signor Baroni's, Miss Quentin, arrives to-day.