"Are you going down to-night, Miss Dorothy?" asked Katy.
"If it isn't too late," she answered, in a tremulous voice, adding: "I want you to lay out the prettiest dress I have, and some nice ribbon for my hair, before you go. I can be dressing while you are gone; it will save that much time."
Katy did as she was bid, and a few moments later was creeping noiselessly down the back stairway, which led to the drawing-room. Drawing the heavy silken portières aside, she peered cautiously in. As she expected, Mr. Kendal and Miss Vincent were enjoying each other's society, quite alone. But that was not the worst of it.
Chapter XVII.
Katy gazed long and earnestly at the picture before her.
Miss Vincent sat at the piano, magnificently dressed in a pale blue chiffon evening dress, with great clusters of pink roses at her belt, at her throat, and in the meshes of her jetty curls.
Beside her, turning over the music, and bending like a lover over her, was Harry Kendal.
And as the girl watched she saw him suddenly lift to his lips the little white hand that was straying over the keys.
"Do let me persuade you to sing for me, Iris," he was saying. "In what have I so far offended you that you are so ungracious to me this evening, Iris?" he murmured, reproachfully.
"I do not know that I am any different to-night from what I have always been," pouted the beauty. "I simply do not feel like singing, that is all."