"There's the man I told you come, Miss Barry," she said eagerly; and Miss Belinda pulled down her glasses and viewed the approach.
"Why, if that isn't Mr. Whitcomb!" she said. She groaned. "I don't think I've got a supper for a man; I do hate to cater for the great, walloping things."
She craned her neck, keeping well out of range of the window in the forlorn hope that the threat might pass by. Forlorn, indeed. What place was there for the visitor to go to?
To her surprise the young man's firm step lingered but a moment at the door, then from her vantage-ground she saw him lift his hat, jump off the piazza, and walk away.
From another window Blanche Aurora's round eyes were watching too, with an unwinking gaze. She wished to see whether the stranger would seek the rock cliff; but evidently Miss Linda had been glad to see him, for he swung energetically across the grass in the opposite direction.
Miss Barry, guiltily conscious of her inhospitable attitude, and remembering with a rush the helpfulness with which Whitcomb had smoothed her path away from Chicago, met Linda as she entered.
What meant the glowing expression in her niece's face? Had there really been more than appeared in her friendship for Fred Whitcomb?
"That was Mr. Whitcomb, wasn't it? Why didn't he come in? What a surprise to see him here," said Miss Barry. "After all," she added mentally, "those broiled lobsters would probably have satisfied him."
Linda put an arm about her aunt's shoulders and drew her into the living-room.
There was a roseate gleam in the dusky distance as Blanche Aurora withdrew through the swing door.