And bending her stately head to the level of Molly’s little pink ear, she breathed into it a sum which, to the simple notions of the mother, seemed more than generous, although, as Mrs. Beaumoris afterward boasted, she was “getting this new girl for half price.”
“Is Kathleen telling of her latest captive?” said Maurice, arriving with his can of oysters, to find their little dining-room aglow with warmth and comfort.
“Nonsense, Morry,” said his sister.
“Yes, but it’s true, she has got her net over not only the great Levitsky, but a man who can help her on tremendously, if he chooses to. And he does choose apparently, since he asked me when he might call here—and by the same token, I told him we’d be having a bit of supper later on, and would be glad to have him drop in.”
“Morry!” said both women, in a breath.
“Well, now, mother, isn’t it my business to look after Kathleen’s musical interests? And didn’t Crichton tell me this fellow was no end of a swell in musical high society? The first time I noticed him was in the train of those Beaumoris females, who appealed to him for everything. But he couldn’t take his eyes off my little sister after she began to play.”
“I never even saw him,” exclaimed Kathleen. “Or, stop! could that have been the beautiful Raphael-faced creature who was standing between the doors during my first piece?”
“I suppose you might call him Raphael-faced,” said Maurice, with a brother’s fine scorn of his sister’s enthusiasm for any man. “But I looked at him purely in a business light, as an impresario of young genius. He talked to me some time, and accepted my invitation to drop in. I don’t know, now that I come to think of it, what there is about Thorndyke, but it’s something not quite—well, I give it up. Judge for yourselves when he arrives.”
And now, all was in readiness for the impromptu feast. On the hob of the grate fire, a kettle, indispensable to the impending brew of Terence’s famous punch, simmered assurance of speedy boiling. Terence—trusting to no one the concoction of a Welsh rarebit, for which he had won renown at Trinity College, Dublin, now years too many ago to be mentioned—was already at work over a chafing-dish. Kathleen, her cheeks crimson, her lips of the true pomegranate tint parted with delight—a large damask napkin pinned over the front of her made-over black satin—was peeling a lemon for the punch. In this branch of culinary service she was admitted to be an adept—so thin, so even, so unbroken the golden spirals she produced!