This was true, and Celia knew it. She hung her head, and when she looked up again, her blue eyes were swimming in tears. She was wondering what her brother would think of her if he knew of the brooch in her pocket, and how she had procured it. She was very sensitive on the point of what people thought of her, and set great store on the good opinion of all with whom she was in any way connected; but she rarely paused to consider nowadays what He thought of her, whose approval should have been her first consideration; and yet, like Joy and Eric, when a tiny child her mother had taught her to say: "Thou God seest me," and almost her first lesson in life had been to learn the meaning of those solemn words.
Eric said no more, and they rejoined their friends; but Celia was unusually subdued in spirits for the rest of the day. She had not relished being taken to task by her brother, though it was not until after they had said good-bye that she commenced to feel actual resentment against him. She came to the conclusion that he had had no right to question her as he had done, and that it was no business of his how she chose to amuse herself.
The August evening was closing in when Mr. Tillotson took the two girls home. They assured him they had spent a pleasant, happy time, and ran upstairs to divest themselves of their best frocks. Then it was that Celia, as she took the butterfly brooch from her pocket, and carefully placed it, as before, at the bottom of her box, was forced to acknowledge to herself that the glittering jewel had spoilt her perfect enjoyment of the flower show, and that she had paid for her vanity with an uneasy mind.
[CHAPTER XVIII.]
CELIA'S LOSS.
"THE weather is hopeless, there's no doubt about that," said Lulu Tillotson, as she lolled on a sofa in her bedroom, on the afternoon subsequent to the flower show. "What a good thing it was it did not rain like this yesterday; if it had the show would have been an utter failure. Oh, dear me, I'm tired of everything—the day, the weather, and myself!"
Celia, who was seated in a comfortable wicker chair, with her feet on an ottoman, and a novel on her knee, made no response. She had come to a most entertaining point in her story, and had no desire to be interrupted. Her taste for light literature was increasing, fed as it had been by a series of sensational stories during the past fortnight. Lulu regarded her with a decidedly discontented expression on her face. She was in the humour for conversation, and seeing her friend was not, she proceeded crossly:
"Do you hear what I say, Celia? Talk, and make yourself agreeable, do! You're not a very cheerful companion for a wet day. Do you always consider your own pleasure before other people's?"
Celia closed the book, and looked up with a flash of resentment in her eyes. Lulu was not very polite to her, considering she was a visitor, she thought; but she refrained from uttering the retort which rose to her lips, and replied pacifically:
"I don't know what you mean, Lulu. I'm quite ready to talk. But what's wrong?"