Matty had tossed off the gaudy silk, and was lying on her bed. Her poor little face was blistered with tears, and, as Mrs. Bell expressed it, it "gave me a heart-ache even to look at her." She was not a woman, however, to own to defeat. She pretended not to see Matty's tears, and she made her tone purposely very cheerful.
"Come, come, child," she said, "what are you stretched on the bed for, as if you were delicate? Now, I wouldn't let this get to Captain Bertram's ears for the world."
"What do you mean, mother?" asked the astonished daughter.
"What I say, my love. I wouldn't let the captain know that you were so tired as to have to lie down after a game of tennis, for a ten pound note. Nothing puts a man off a girl so soon as to hear that she's delicate."
"Oh, he—he doesn't care," half sobbed Matty.
"Oh, doesn't he, though? I never knew anything more like caring than for him to be too shy to come near you. Things have gone pretty far when a man has to blind his mother by pretending to be taken up with another girl. I knew the captain was in love, Matty, but I did not suppose he was deep enough to play his cards after that fashion. You get up now, lovey, and come down, and have a nice hot cup of tea. It will revive you wonderfully, my pet."
Matty allowed her mother to coax her off the bed, and to assist her on with her every-day brown holland frock. She was a good deal comforted and inclined to reconsider the position which had seemed so hopeless half-an-hour ago.
"Only he did neglect me shamefully," she said, with a little toss of her head. "And I don't see why I should take it from him."
"That's right, my girl. You show Captain Bertram you've got a spirit of your own. There's nothing brings a man to the point like a girl giving him a little bit of sauce. Next time he speaks to you, you can be as stand-off as you please, Matty."
"Yes, mother," said Matty, in a languid tone.