The dinner party on Christmas Eve was the first of a series of brilliant festivities, extending all through the hot last week of 1880, and over the cool new year (for which fires were lighted and furs brought out again), and into the sultry middle of January, and up to the memorable anniversary of the day on which the three Miss Kings had first arrived in Melbourne; and when they were over this was the state of the sisters' affairs:—Elizabeth a little tired with so much dissipation, but content to do all that was asked of her, since she was not asked to leave her husband's side; Eleanor, still revelling in the delights of wealth and power, and in Mr. Westmoreland's accumulating torments; and Patty worn and pale with sleepless nights and heart-sick with hope deferred, longing to set herself straight with Paul Brion before she left Australia, and seeing her chances of doing so dwindling and fading day by day. And now they were beginning to prepare for their voyage to a world yet larger and fuller than the one in which they had lived and learned so much.
One afternoon, while Mrs. Duff-Scott and Eleanor paid calls, Elizabeth and Patty went for the last time to Myrtle Street, to pack up the bureau and some of their smaller household effects in preparation for the men who were to clear the rooms on the morrow. Mr. Yelverton accompanied them, and lingered in the small sitting-room for awhile, helping here and there, or pretending to do so. For his entertainment they boiled the kettle and set out the cheap cups and saucers, and they had afternoon tea together, and Patty played the Moonlight Sonata; and then Elizabeth bade her husband go and amuse himself at his club and come back to them in an hour's time. He went, accordingly; and the two sisters pinned up their skirts and tucked up their sleeves, and worked with great diligence when he was no longer there to distract them. They worked so well that at the end of half an hour they had nothing left to do, except a little sorting of house linen and books. Elizabeth undertaking this business, Patty pulled down her sleeves and walked to the window; and she stood there for a little while, leaning her arm on the frame and her head on her arm.
"Paul Brion is at home, Elizabeth," she said, presently.
"Is he, dear?" responded the elder sister, who had begun to think (because her husband thought it) that it was a pity Paul Brion, being so hopelessly cantankerous, should be allowed to bother them any more.
"Yes. And, Elizabeth, I hope you won't mind—it is very improper, I know—but I shall go and see him. It is my last chance. I will go and say good-bye to Mrs. M'Intyre, and then I will run up to his room and speak to him—just for one minute. It is my last chance," she repeated; "I shall never have another."
"But, my darling—"
"Oh, don't be afraid"—drawing herself up haughtily—"I am not going to be quite a fool. I shall not throw myself into his arms. I am simply going to apologise for cutting him on Cup Day. I am simply going to set myself right with him before I go away—for his father's sake."
"It is a risky experiment, my dear, whichever way you look at it. I think you had better write."
"No. I have no faith in writing. You cannot make a letter say what you mean. And he will not come to us—he will not share his father's friendship for Kingscote—he was not at home when you and Kingscote called on him—he was not even at Mrs. Aarons's on Friday. There is no way to get at him but to go and see him now. I hear him in his room, and he is alone. I will not trouble him long—I will let him see that I can do without him quite as well as he can do without me—but I must and will explain the horrible mistake that I know he has fallen into about me, before I lose the chance for the rest of my life."
"My dear, how can you? How can you tell him your true reason for cutting him? How can you do it at all, without implying more than you would like to imply? You had better leave it, Patty. Or let me go for you, my darling."