As Doris listened, doubts began to form in her mind. It seemed incomprehensible that this boasting, crude stranger could really be her cousin. There must be a mistake, she told herself. Ronald Trent was not a relative; of that she felt certain.
“Well, girlies, isn’t it about time you trundled off to your little beds?” he asked, looking insinuatingly at Doris and Kitty.
“I imagine you girls are tired,” Azalea murmured. “If you like, I can have Cora show you to your room.”
“Oh, we’re not sleepy yet,” Kitty said mischievously.
Ronald Trent fairly glared at her.
“Run along now,” he said lightly, but with a look which warned the girls he expected to be obeyed. “I have some business to talk over with Iris and Azalea.”
Iris rang for Cora, and the girls reluctantly followed her upstairs through a long hall and down a number of steps into a wing which branched off to the right. Cora showed them their room and left them alone.
“Looks as if we’re to be off in this wing all by ourselves,” Kitty said uneasily. “This place is too spooky to suit me.”
The room was large and austere with long mirrors and an old-fashioned four-poster bed and dresser. Several rag rugs were scattered over the bare floor. Double windows looked down over the side veranda and the branches of a sprawling maple tree brushed against the panes.
As a precautionary measure Kitty looked under the bed and peeped into the closet.