That detestable housemaid again! If Catty Clowrie had been a man, she might have indulged in the manly relief of swearing, as she sprang up a second time, and fled into Mrs. Hill's room. This time, Rosie was not called away, and she sat for nearly an hour, singing, at her chamber window, and mending her stockings. Catty Clowrie, on fire with impotent fury, had to stay where she was.
Staying there, she saw Miss Henderson's door opened at last; and, peeping cautiously out, saw the two go down-stairs together. Miss Rose looked as if she had been crying, and her face was very pale, but the fierce crimson of excitement burned on the dark cheeks and flamed in the black eyes of Miss Henderson. It was the heiress who let Miss Rose out, and then she came back to her room, and resumed the old trick of walking up and down, up and down, as on the preceding night.
Catty wondered if she would never be tired. It was all true, then; and there was a dark secret and mystery in Olive Henderson's life. "Olive!" Was that her name, and if so, why had Miss Rose called her "Harriet." And if the governess's name was Winnie, why did the heiress call her "Olly?"
Catty Clowrie sat thinking while the April day faded into misty twilight, and the cold evening star glimmered down on the sea. She sat there thinking while the sun went low, and dipped into the bay, and out of sight. She sat thinking while the last little pink cloud of the sunset paled to dull gray, and the round white moon came up, like a shining shield. She sat there thinking till the dinner-bell rang, and she remembered she was cold and hungry, and went slowly down-stairs—still thinking.
To her surprise, for she had been too absorbed to hear her come out of her room, Miss Henderson was there, beautifully dressed, and in high spirits. She had such a passion for luxury and costly dress, this young lady, that she would array herself in velvets and brocades, even though there were none to admire her but her own servants.
On this evening, she had dressed herself in white, with ornaments of gold and coral in her black braids, broad gold bracelets on her superb arms, and a cluster of scarlet flowers on her breast. She looked so beautiful with that fire in her eyes, that flush on her cheek, that brilliant smile lighting up her gypsy face, that Mrs. Hill and Catty were absolutely dazzled. She laughed—a clear, ringing laugh—at Mrs. Hill's profuse congratulations on her magical recovery.
"You dear old Mrs. Hill!" she said, "when you are better used to mo, you will cease to wonder at my eccentricities! It is a woman's privilege to change her mind sixty times an hour, if she chooses—and I choose to assert all the privileges of my sex!"
She rose from the table as she spoke, still laughing, and went into the drawing-room. The gas burned low, but she turned it up to its full flare, and, opening the piano, rattled off a stormy polka. She twirled round presently, and called out:
"Mrs. Hill!"
Mrs. Hill came in.