"Wait a minute, my man," said Mr. Guyon in his cheery way; "I'll open the door," and he suited the action to the word. "What have you got there? O, I see,--a parcel and a note for my daughter. You're paid, are you, eh? Never mind; here's another sixpence--good-day."
The man turned away, well pleased, and Mr. Guyon, carrying the parcel in his hand, went on into his own room. There was a note with the parcel; which was evidently a roll of music. Mr. Guyon looked at it, considered it, finally, muttering "It will always be easy to say the fellow must have lost it," he opened and read the missive. As he did so, his face brightened up. "Out of town, eh? on important business; trusts to see her the moment he returns, eh? Not if I know it, Mr. Frere,--not if I know it." Then Mr. Guyon put the note carefully away in his pocketbook, for destruction at a convenient season.
He next proceeded to search among a heap of cards stuck into the frame of the chimney-glass for one bearing the inscription "Mr. Gordon Frere," passed it under the riband with which the parcel was fastened, and rang the bell.
"Take this to Miss Guyon," said he to the footman, who answered the summons. "A commissionaire brought it just now."
Katharine was standing by one of the windows when the man entered the drawing-room, salver in hand. Her tall graceful figure and proud head expressed eager anticipation and waiting in their attitude.
"A parcel, ma'am," said the man; "a commissioner 'ave brought it."
"Put it down," she said, without turning her head; and several minutes elapsed before she looked round, or remembered the interruption. At length she sighed impatiently, and said aloud: "He will hardly come now, it is too near lunchtime; and if he comes later, the room is sure to be full of bores, as usual. However, I had rather he came, no matter who may be here. But it is very stupid of him not to call early." At this moment her eye lighted on the parcel, and the card attached to it. The colour rushed violently into her face, and then subsided, leaving Katharine many shades paler than usual.
Mr. Guyon was in very good spirits when he met his daughter at lunch. He talked and laughed and made himself as agreeable as if she had been somebody else's daughter and worth cultivating. He congratulated Katharine on her appearance both at the fête and at dinner on the previous day; he asked her where her bonnet came from, and whether her milliner was determined to ruin him completely this season? To all these sallies Katharine replied little; she was pale, distraite, decidedly out of humour. Mr. Guyon shot sharp inquiring glances at her across the table, wholly unperceived. He was a little surprised at her mood. "By Jove!" he thought, "she has been harder bit than I suspected, and this has been a near thing, I fancy. I've only given Hetty the office just in time. Something must be done before this dandy fellow comes back,--and it won't be too easy to manage Kate either."
These reflections troubled Mr. Guyon a little, and repressed the fine flow of his spirits; but his daughter took as little notice of one of his moods as of the other.
"Have you heard how Lady Henmarsh is to-day?" she asked absently; and the seemingly harmless question brought a more impartially diffused colour to Mr. Guyon's face than the evenly-defined bloom which usually embellished it.