Harold’s schoolboy effusion made her smile, but there was something in Grace’s pretty letter that touched her.
“I am sure I shall like this girl,” she said, and then she began to discuss ways and means. “You must take your smartest tea gown, and make yourself ever so pretty, mother, dear one.”
“And you, Polly?”
“Oh!” with a shrug of her shoulders, “I am all right. I never look magnificent, and I certainly shall not pretend to dress up smartly for these people.”
“You see,” Mrs. Pennington ventured to remark, “you see, Polly, I was quite right, Mr. Ambleton did not invent. I am sure he will be very pleased if we go.”
“Oh! as to that!” said haughty Polly, “I shall wait a little longer before I pass any opinion. He will have to pretend he is pleased, whether he is or not. After all, we shall be his guests, remember.”
Mrs. Pennington took up the cudgels on Valentine’s behalf in real earnest.
“Unless Mr. Ambleton were a very kind man, I am sure he would not have asked Harold to stay with him. Come, Polly, you must confess that?”
“I won’t confess anything,” Polly cried. “I am a pig-headed person, and when I think things—well, I think them, and there is an end of the matter.”
“Under these circumstances, then, it will be better for us to refuse Mr. Ambleton’s invitation,” said gentle Mrs. Pennington, with a smile just flickering at the corners of her mouth, and, of course, Polly at once combated this suggestion, and Mrs. Pennington’s answer to Grace’s letter was a cordial acceptance of the invitation for herself and daughter to spend a few days in Dynechester.