“No?” said Hetty, very sharply. “What do you mean, Flo?”
Miss Schuyler smiled a little and looked Grant in the eyes. “What would appear base treachery in Hetty’s case would be less astonishing in me. Mr. Grant, you must not run risks again to talk to me, but since you have done it I must see you through. You are sure there is only one cow-boy in the hall, Hetty?”
Hetty turned and looked at them. Flora Schuyler was smiling bravely, the man standing still with grave astonishment in his eyes.
“No,” she said, with quick incisiveness, “I can’t let you, Flo.”
“I don’t think I asked your permission,” said Miss Schuyler. “Could you explain this to your father, Hetty? I believe he would not be angry with me. Adventurous gallantry is, I understand, quite approved of on the prairie. Call your maid. Mr. Grant, will you come with me?”
For several seconds Hetty stood silent, recognizing that what Torrance might smile at in his guest would appear almost a crime in his daughter, but still horribly unwilling. Then, as Flora Schuyler, with a half-impatient gesture, signed to Grant, she touched a little gong, and a few moments later her maid met them in the corridor. The girl stopped suddenly, gasping a little as she stared at Grant, until Hetty grasped her arm, nipping it cruelly.
“If you scream or do anything silly you will be ever so sorry,” she said. “Go down into the hall and talk to Jo. Keep him where the stove is, with his back to the door.”
“But how am I to do it?” the girl asked.
“Take him something to eat,” Miss Schuyler said impatiently. “Any way, it should not be hard to fool him—I have seen him looking at you. Now, I wonder if that grey dress of mine would fit you—I have scarcely had it on, but it’s a little too tight for me.”
The girl’s eyes glistened, she moved swiftly down the corridor, Flora Schuyler laughed, and Grant looked away.