Mr. Stanford did not seem to hear; he was whistling to Tiger, lumbering on the lawn. When he did speak, it was without looking at her.
"I am going to Ottawa next week."
"To Ottawa! With M. La Touche?" asked Kate, while Rose's face flushed up.
"Yes; he wants me to go, and I have said yes. I shall stay until the end of April."
Kate looked at him a little wistfully, but said nothing. Rose turned suddenly, and ran upstairs.
"We shall miss you—I shall miss you," she said at last.
"It will not be for long," he answered, carelessly. "Come in and sing me a song."
The first pang of doubt that had ever crossed Kate's mind of her handsome lover, crossed it now, as she followed him into the drawing-room.
"How careless he is!" she thought; "how willing to leave me! And I—could I be contented anywhere in the world where he was not?"
By some mysterious chance, the song she selected was Eeny's "smile again, my dearest love; weep not that I leave thee."