"I don't know what you mean by ungenerous. Other people—"
There was a step on the stairs. Helen flew away, and Cousin Mary, going her way down, nearly fell into the arms of Mrs. Desmond's maid.
"I was coming up, miss, to see if I could assist you," said that individual demurely.
Cousin Mary put her aside rather coldly and proceeded to the drawing-room, where the guests were already gathered, and where Mrs. Desmond glanced at her cousin with some displeasure. This was occasioned not only by the lateness of Miss Macleod's arrival, but by the plainness of her attire, which, in Mrs. Desmond's opinion, was emphasized by a great bunch of lilies of the valley pinned carelessly in the front of her bodice without any attempt at arrangement, and looking, as that lady afterwards said, as if they had just come from the nearest greengrocer—a guess that came considerably nearer to the truth than most guesses do.
Dinner was a long and rather tedious affair. Cousin Mary's neighbours were not particularly entertaining, and although she tried to exert herself to talk her thoughts wandered constantly to the lonely child upstairs. In the drawing-room matters were still worse. Most of the ladies present were known to each other, and their small gossip sounded quite meaningless to an utter stranger like Miss Macleod. Mrs. Desmond, who, to do her justice, was never negligent of her duties as a hostess, noticed her cousin's abstraction, and tried more than once to draw her into the conversation, but without much success. When the gentlemen appeared there was a little very indifferent music, and then the company dispersed. Cousin Mary was heartily glad to find herself once more in her own room. But although she had pleaded fatigue in the drawing-room she seemed in no hurry to get into bed. Replacing her silk dress by a soft Cashmere gown, she opened her door and listened. Presently she heard Mrs. Desmond come up the stairs to her own room on the floor below. Cousin Mary peeped over the banisters and saw that the maid was in attendance. She waited until she heard the bed-room door close upon mistress and maid, and then she walked quietly upstairs, smiling to herself all the time.
Arrived upon the landing, she looked about her, and presently espying a door standing partly open, and, peeping in, she saw at once she had reached her goal, for by the faint light that came in through the uncurtained window she could discern Helen lying in bed and tossing about restlessly.
"Are you awake, Helen?" asked Cousin Mary softly.
Helen sat up in bed.
"Oh!" she cried, "have you really come to see me? I was afraid to expect you. And yet—"
"Yet you had a notion that I might come."