“How, my dear?”
“Major Clare, mamma. I told him that perhaps I meant to give it up to Emberance—and then—he never said any more. I thought I must tell him.”
“Major Clare! Ah, I have been very unlike a mother. My poor little girl—have you had this to bear? such a cruel form of disappointment.”
“I have quite got over it,” said Kate seriously; “I was too young, I think, to know my own mind really.”
A vivid blush dyed her face, and her eyes, which had been frankly lifted, dropped as she spoke—as if some new consciousness came over her.
Mrs Kingsworth lingered, watching her; she thought naturally of Walter and his hopes, and wondered what he would say now the important matter was decided.
But nothing was to be said of it openly, and nothing of course could be done until Katharine came of age in the ensuing January. The hopes which Canon Kingsworth could hold out in his kind and cheering answer to Malcolm Mackenzie’s letter were of the vaguest; and Emberance, still insisting that Kate could settle nothing yet, would have no word said to her mother until the deed was actually done. Nor did Walter consider himself justified in trying to gain her promise until the important birthday was passed.
On the 15th of the next January, at Kingsworth itself, Katharine was to make her final decision, and until then, where were she and her mother to go? Kate professed herself quite willing to return to Applehurst; but she had rather not pass the intervening months at Kingsworth, where every one supposed that her birthday would make her entirely mistress. Mr and Mrs Kingsworth, of Silthorpe, sent them a very warm invitation to visit them in the North; and it was finally agreed that this should be accepted; after which they would go abroad for two or three months, and spend the autumn and winter at Applehurst.
This programme was faithfully carried out. Kate enjoyed Silthorpe, and saw a great deal of Walter, though she made no further attempt to confide in him. He was very kind, and planned all sorts of schemes for her pleasure; but she was a little troubled by the sort of distance between them, and spent much time in secretly wondering whether Walter liked her as much as ever, or if her impulsive childishness on their first acquaintance had not repelled him.
On the other hand she made quick strides in friendship with all his family, and liked them better than any people she had ever seen. She carried a sense of unrest and unsettlement abroad with her, the uncomfortable feeling of a crisis in the air, and afterwards, in the slow weeks at Applehurst, her chief feeling was of longing for the deed to be done. Her own desire was that she and her mother should take a house at Fanchester. There would be society and companionship and a life that would be far pleasanter to live than either Applehurst or Kingsworth.