Fortunately for Katy, Esther had been in the family long enough to know just what they regarded proper, as by this means the dress selected was sure to please. It was very becoming to Katy, and having been made in Paris was not open to criticism.
“Very pretty indeed,” was Mrs. Cameron’s verdict, when at half-past five she came in to see her daughter, kissing her cheek and stroking her head, wholly unadorned except by the short, silken curls which could not be coaxed to grow faster than they chose, and which had sometimes annoyed Wilford, they made his wife seem so young beside him. Mrs. Cameron was annoyed, too, for she had no idea of a head except as it was connected with a hair-dresser, and her annoyance showed itself as she asked,
“Did you have your hair cut on purpose?”
But when Katy explained, she answered pleasantly,
“Never mind, it is a fault which will mend every day, only it makes you look like a child.”
“I am eighteen and a half,” Katy said, feeling a lump rising in her throat, for she guessed that her mother-in-law was not quite pleased with her hair.
For herself, she liked it, it was so easy to brush and fix. She should go wild if she had to submit to all Esther had told her of hair-dressing and what it involved.
Mrs. Cameron had asked if she would not like to see Mr. Cameron, the elder, before going down to dinner, and Katy had answered that she would; so as soon as Esther had smoothed a refractory fold and brought her handkerchief, she followed to the room where Wilford’s father was sitting. He might not have felt complimented could he have known that something in his appearance reminded Katy of Uncle Ephraim. He was not nearly as old or as tall, nor was his hair as white, but the resemblance, if there were any, lay in the smile with which he greeted Katy, calling her his youngest child, and drawing her closely to him.
It was remarked of Mr. Cameron that since their babyhood he had never kissed one of his own children; but when Katy, who looked upon such a salutation as a matter of course, put up her rosy lips, making the first advance, he kissed her twice. Hearty, honest kisses they were, for the man was strongly drawn towards the young girl, who said to him timidly,
“I am glad to have a father—mine died before I could remember him. May I call you so?”