"Tell me," she whispered, nervously clutching the girl's hand, "where is Harry, and is—is Miss Vincent with him, and how does she look?"
Before Katy could frame a reply the last question was rudely answered by a stranger. Two young ladies at that instant dropped down into seats so near Dorothy that she could easily have touched them had she reached out her hand from her screen of palms and roses.
"What a magnificent-looking girl that Iris Vincent is!" cried one of the young girls. "The fame of her great beauty is spreading everywhere; but I never dreamed she was as beautiful as the description I have heard of her, and I find she far surpasses it. I wonder that poor, blind Dorothy Glenn is not jealous that her affianced husband should pay the girl so much attention."
"This is the first time I have seen her," replied her companion, "and I, too, am amazed at her marvelous beauty. As I stepped into the ball-room she was the first person I beheld, and she has dazzled my eyes ever since. Oh, it was a wonderful picture she made, standing under a slender palm tree, in her white tulle dress flecked with gold and pearls, and those blood-red rubies encircling her white throat and perfect arms and coiled in her jetty curls; and then those glorious dark eyes! No wonder men lose their hearts over her at the first fatal glance into their wonderful, mesmeric depths. She is fairer than the fairest of poets' dreams."
Dorothy listened with bated breath, then turned quickly to Katy.
"Have you deceived me—me, a poor blind girl?" she cried in a terrible voice that sounded like a cry from the tomb. "You told me that the girl who had come beneath this roof was homely and terribly plain. They say she is beautiful. Oh, God! have you deceived me? I must know the truth at once."
Chapter XIX.
"Katy," repeated Dorothy, in a shrill, awful whisper, "tell me, have you willfuly deceived me? You have said Miss Vincent was plain—nay, more, that she was homely—and on all sides of me I hear them speaking of her wonderful beauty."
Katy sank back shivering in her seat.
"It's fine feathers that make fine birds to-night," she rejoined, faintly. "No wonder they think Iris Vincent looks well to-night. She's rigged out like a real peacock; and her face is painted, too. I can see it clear across the room; and I am quite sure that Mr. Kendal has noticed it; and I've heard him say that if there's anything which he detests, it's girls who whiten their faces with chalk."