I gave her what she required, and she ate without looking at me, her sharp eyes wandering round and round the room.
"Why, how hideous!" she suddenly exclaimed. "How more than wrong of Clarkson! I gave orders that the curtains in this room were to be rose-pink; those dull blue abominations must come down; we won't have them—they'd try anyone's complexion. Child, for goodness' sake don't stare! And yet, come and let me look at you. That blue dress suits you; but then you are young, and you have a complexion for blue."
She patted my hand for a minute, then she yawned profoundly.
"I am glad to be home," she said. "A honeymoon when you are no longer young is fatiguing, to say the least of it, and I am sick of hotel life. I have already sent out my 'At Home' invitations, and for the next few days the house will be crammed every afternoon. You will have to be present—why, of course, you will—don't knit your brows together like that. I mean to be a good stepmother to you, Heather. Ah, here comes Gordon. Gordon, you look very presentable now. Sit close to me on this sofa, and let Heather give you some tea. It's nice to have one's own girl to wait on one, isn't it?"
"Profoundly nice," said the Major; "exquisitely nice. To think that we have a child of our very own, Helen!"
"I don't think about it," replied Lady Helen. "It isn't my custom to wear myself out going into raptures, but, Gordon, I am very seriously displeased about those curtains."
"Curtains, dear—what ails them? I see nothing wrong in them."
"But I do. I told Clarkson's people rose-colour, soft rose-colour, and they sent blue—I will never get anything at Clarkson's again."
"They must be changed, sweetest one," replied my father.
I was giving him a cup of tea just then, and my hand shook. My stepmother noticed this; she said, in a sharp voice: