Aloud she added, gently:
“I believe I will write the invitation now.”
“But, mother dear, you are not able to——”
“I am able to write a few lines, and I am able to sit up and to get about my room a little. And I want them to come over here as soon as possible,” she added, her eyes lighting up, her pale cheeks flushing slightly. “Place writing materials on my desk, Leonard, and wheel it to my side. There, that is right!”
She seemed strangely elated and quite excited over the prospect of the visitors from The Oaks. Leonard could not understand it. But he silently obeyed her directions, and in a few moments the note was written, the most cordial and neighborly note that Mrs. Yorke had ever written to any one at The Oaks. She laid before Mrs. Rutledge what a benefit the change would be to herself and the young ladies, and then it would be a charity to Mrs. Yorke and Miss Glyndon to have them come to Yorke Towers.
The invitation was received in due time by Mrs. Rutledge, and promptly accepted without reference to Violet. This was too good a chance to be lost for Hilda to try and win Leonard Yorke.
Mrs. Rutledge smiled with a swift, furtive glance in the direction of her daughter when she read the invitation aloud. Hilda returned the glance with a significant nod.
“Strange that you have never visited Yorke Towers, Violet,” she observed.
Violet smiled.
“Oh, no, not at all. There was something unpleasant, I have always fancied, between Mrs. Yorke and my poor mother. What it was, I do not know. Aunt Constance, do you know anything about it? Or, perhaps, I ought not to ask.”