The person bent on such an errand was so commonly of serious and elderly aspect that the extremely stylish young man who rode into the yard one afternoon was not suspected by the girls, who saw him from the parlor, of belonging to this class. Kate, who was nearest the window, was quite excited by the appearance of a gentleman on horseback. She had not seen one before since she left home, and the horse itself was as interesting as the rider.
“I’ll wager anything that’s a blooded Kentucky,” she said, craning her neck for a fuller view. “My, but isn’t she a beauty? I’ll have a good look at her if his highness gets down. Wouldn’t I like to call out, ‘Light, and come in, stranger!’” she added under her breath. “Stella, who is he? He must be some admirer of yours.”
“Never saw him before,” said Stella, who was eying him with as much curiosity as Kate. “I’ll tell you what, he must be a connoisseur in art and has heard of my Breton Peasant. Ha! With that horse and that riding costume I shall charge him a hundred and fifty.”
By this time the young man had reached the hitching post and jumped down from the saddle. He patted his horse’s neck when he had adjusted the hitching rein, flicked the dust from his riding boots with his gold-handled whip, and proceeded toward the door.
“You go, Kate,” whispered Stella, who was drawing Greenaway figures with pen and ink on a set of table doilies, and Kate was not loath.
“Is Deacon Saxon at home?” inquired the young man in a pleasant voice.
“I think so. Will you come in?” responded Kate.
“It isn’t the Breton Peasant after all,” murmured Stella to Esther. “I wonder if it can be an ancestor.” She arranged the doilies with a quick artistic touch, and rose as the young man entered the room.
He had presented Kate with a small engraved card, and though it was a new discovery for her that gentlemen ever carried such things, she used it as if to the manner born.
“Mr. Philip Hadley, Miss Saxon and Miss Northmore,” she announced easily, and Stella added, with a pretty bow, “And, Mr. Hadley, Miss Kate Northmore.”