Winifred looked at him anxiously, with eyes almost as troubled as his own.
"Yes," she said in an undertone, "and let us get away as soon as possible."
Mrs. Gray consented genially to be escorted to the room, elaborately decorated, where charmingly-gowned young women dispensed elegant refreshments. Several gentlemen, among whom Hubert recognized elders of the church, with their wives and other ladies, passed gay bandinage one to another as they sipped cooling ices. Hubert took nothing, but stood, silent and stern, while his mother, unconscious of the tempest in his breast, leisurely and daintily enjoyed her refreshment.
"Where are the poor people?" Hubert asked Winifred in something of his old sarcastic tone, as they left the room.
"I am afraid they are not here," said she, gently. Then she glanced around. "Yes, there are some, I see. There is Madge Nichol, that young woman in the stylish blue dress. She has done sewing for me, and seemed to need the money very much. But see how she is dressed! It must be much beyond her means."
Then a womanly intuition smote her, and she looked down at her own costly dress.
"I see how it is, Hubert," she said. "I think we are to blame. No girl would like to meet us in this way unless she were well dressed."
"I should advise them to stay away," said Hubert. "They would lose nothing valuable."
"That is what I shall do, I think," said Winifred with a sigh. "Do let us get away as soon as mother is ready."
"Shall I see if the carriage is waiting, mother?" said Hubert, interrupting when he could a discussion of the best places in which to spend the coming heated term.