Nearly all the family had had something to say to Billy on the matter, with not entirely satisfactory results, when Kate determined to see what she could do. She chose a time when she could have the girl quite to herself with small likelihood of interruption.
“But, Billy, how could you do such an absurd thing?” she demanded. “The idea of leaving my house alone, at half-past ten at night, to follow a couple of men through the streets of Boston, and then with my brothers' butler make a scene like that in a—a public dining-room!”
Billy sighed in a discouraged way.
“Aunt Kate, can't I make you and the rest of them understand that I didn't start out to do all that? I meant just to speak to Mr. Bertram, and get him away from that man.”
“But, my dear child, even that was bad enough!”
Billy lifted her chin.
“You don't seem to think, Aunt Kate; Mr. Bertram was—was not sober.”
“All the more reason then why you should NOT have done what you did!”
“Why, Aunt Kate, you wouldn't leave him alone in that condition with that man!”
It was Mrs. Hartwell's turn to sigh.