CHAPTER XXII.
HELEN IN SOCIETY.
It was three days before Christmas, and Katy was talking confidentially to Mrs. Banker, whom she had asked to see the next time she called.
“I want so much to surprise her,” she said, speaking in a whisper, “and you have been so kind to us both that I thought it might not trouble you very much if I asked you to make the selection for me, and see to the engraving. Wilford gave me fifty dollars, all I needed, as I had fifty more of my own, and now that I have a baby, I am sure I shall never again care to go out.”
“Yes,” Mrs. Banker said, thoughtfully, as she rolled up the bills, “you wish me to get as heavy bracelets as I can find—for the hundred dollars.”
“Yes,” Katy replied, “I think that will please her, don’t you?”
Mrs. Banker did not reply at once, for she felt certain that the hundred dollars could be spent in a manner more satisfactory to Helen. Still she hardly liked to interfere, until Katy, observing her hesitancy, asked again if she did not think Helen would be pleased.
“Yes, pleased with anything you choose to give her, but—excuse me, dear Mrs. Cameron, if I speak as openly as if I were the mother of you both. Bracelets are suitable for you who have everything else, but is there not something your sister needs more? Now, allowing me to suggest, I should say, buy her some furs, and let the bracelets go. In Silverton her furs were well enough, but here, as the sister of Mrs. Wilford Cameron, she is deserving of better.”
Katy understood Mrs. Banker at once, her cheeks reddening as there flashed upon her the reason why Wilford had never yet been in the street with Helen, notwithstanding that she had more than once requested it.
“You are right,” she said. “It was thoughtless in me not to think of this myself. Helen shall have the furs, and whatever else is necessary. I am so glad you reminded me of it. You are as kind as my own mother,” and Katy kissed her friend fondly as she bade her good-bye, charging her a dozen times not to let Helen know the surprise in store for her.
There was little need of this caution, for Mrs. Banker understood human nature too well to divulge a matter which might wound one as sensitive as Helen. Between the latter and herself there was a strong bond of friendship, and to the kind patronage of this lady Helen owed most of the attentions she had as yet received from her sister’s friends, while Mark Ray did much toward lifting her to the place she held in spite of the common country dress, which Juno unsparingly criticised, and which, in fact, kept Wilford from taking her out as his wife so often asked him to do. And Helen, too, keenly felt the difference between herself and those with whom she came in contact, crying over it more than once, but never dreaming of the surprise in store for her, when on Christmas morning she went as usual to Katy’s room, finding her alone, her face all aglow with excitement, and her bed a perfect show-case of dry goods, which she bade Helen examine and say how she liked them.