Vixen yawned despondently.
"What do we care about the season, mamma?" she exclaimed. "Can it matter to us whether there are two or three thousand extra people in the place? It only makes the King's Road a little more uncomfortable."
"My dear Violet, at your age gaiety is good for you," said Mrs. Tempest.
"Yes, and, like most other things that are good, it's very disagreeable," retorted Vixen.
"And now, about this ball," pursued Mrs. Tempest, taking up a dropped stitch in the previous argument; "I really think we ought to go, if it were only on Violet's account. Don't you, Maria?"
Mrs. Tempest always called her governess Maria when she was anxious to conciliate her.
"Violet is old enough to enter society, certainly," said Miss McCroke, with some deliberation; "but whether a public ball——"
"If it's on my account, mamma, pray don't think of going," protested Vixen earnestly. "I hate the idea of a ball—I hate——"
"Captain Winstanley," announced Forbes, in the dusky end of the drawing-room by the door.
"He has saved me the trouble of finishing my sentence," muttered Vixen.