“Are you going back soon?” asked Fayette.
“’Bout half an hour or so. Tell ye what. I’ll call when I’ve done my arrands, and then you’ll have your minds made up.”
“O, thank you, Carlos,” said Fayette, gratefully. “I wish you would.”
Helen said nothing; but as they walked back to the house, she looked perplexed and annoyed. “So provoking of Sue,” she broke out at last. “If there was anything really the matter, why couldn’t she send a note? But she is so nervous and fanciful.”
“Sue’s not very strong, and you know Hiram is no one to depend upon. I hope Mrs. Allison and Eleanor will be back before we go.”
“So you are going?” said Helen, as if the idea vexed her.
“Why, Helen, I think one of us should go. If aunt had such an attack as she had in the winter, what could Sue do?”
“I dare say it is only her fancy,” said Helen. “But you are as ready to fancy things as she is, Fayette. If there were any reason for anxiety,” she continued in the even tones which had contributed to establish Helen Ford’s character as a “superior girl,”—“If there were any reason for anxiety, don’t you suppose I should be as anxious about my mother as you can be, who never saw her till you came to live with us three months ago?”
There was a covert sting in these words which Fayette felt and resented, but she held her tongue.
“Then I don’t want to miss this lecture,” Helen resumed. “It is the last of the set, and I feel it my duty to improve every opportunity that is offered me.”