Nellie drew back, half frightened.
“Yes, ma’am. No, ma’am. I don’t know, ma’am,” she stammered.
“But how came she to send for me? Who told her I was here?”
“The boss.”
“The—boss!”
“Yes. Mr. McGinnis, ye know. He said as how you was here.”
“Bobby!” cried Miss Kendall, releasing the child’s arm and falling back a step. “Why, of course, it’s Patty—it must be Patty! I’ll go to her at once. Wait here while I dress.” And she hurried across the hall and up the broad stairway.
Back by the door Nellie watched the disappearing blue draperies with wistful eyes that bore also a trace of resentment. “Go and dress” indeed! As if there could be anything more altogether to be desired than that beautiful trailing blue gown! She was even more dissatisfied ten minutes later when Miss Kendall came back in the trim brown suit and walking-hat—it would have been so much more delightful to usher into Mrs. Durgin’s presence that sumptuous robe of blue! She forgot her disappointment, however, a little later, in the excitement of rolling along at Miss Kendall’s side in the Hilcrest carriage, with the imposing-looking coachman in the Spencer livery towering above her on the seat in front.
It had been Miss Kendall’s first thought to order the runabout, but a sudden remembrance of her morning’s experience a few weeks before caused her to think that the stalwart John and the horses might be better; so John, somewhat to his consternation, it must be confessed, had been summoned to take his orders from Nellie as to roads and turns. He now sat, stern and dignified, in the driver’s seat, showing by the very lines of his stiffly-held body his entire disapproval of the whole affair.
Nor were John and Betty the only ones at Hilcrest who were conscious of keen disapproval that morning. The mistress herself, from an upper window, watched with dismayed eyes the departure of the carriage.