This time Ethel laughed. But no one noticed it. It was rather disappointing.
"At last I shall see Nicholas again," thought Belle,—"at last!"
And the little mother folded up the cable very carefully and slipped it back into the book. Peter had sent it to her,—to her.
And then Belle turned her attention to her little sister, who not only looked most interesting, but knew that she did. "I think you condescended to be amused, Grandmamma," she said, in the most good-natured spirit of chaff. Like everybody else in the family she was really rather proud of this very finished production of an ultra-modern and fashionable school.
"I seem to have missed a lot of fun by not going to Europe," replied Ethel. "It would have been very entertaining to watch you and Betty fall in love."
"I guess so," said Belle. "The only thing is that you would have been very much odd man out. They draw the line at little school-girls at Oxford."
"Now don't begin to quarrel, girls," said Mrs. Guthrie. "I'm very sorry Ethel wasn't with us. The trip would have widened her view and given her much to think about. But never mind. She shall go with us next time."
Ethel stifled a yawn. "Thank you, mamma, dear. But when I go to England I may elect to stay there. I think it's very probable that I shall marry an Englishman and settle down to country life, doing London in the season."
Belle's laugh rang out. "That's the sort of thing we have to put up with, Betty," she said. "You're going to marry a Duke, aren't you, Baby, and be a Lady in Waiting at Court, with a full-page photograph every week in the Tatler? When Peter comes home he'll find you a constant source of joy. My descriptions of the way in which you've come on while he's been away always made him laugh."
Ethel rose languidly from the sofa, at the side of which a little nourishment had been served. Mrs. Guthrie, who had been busily at work knitting a scarf for Graham—a thing that he would certainly never wear—went quickly to give her a hand. "Are you going to your room now, darling?" she asked.