"Pretty little thing! it likes to be squeezed," responded Mrs. Chandos. "It is hiding itself from you; from that ugly bonnet. You do wear frightful bonnets, Mrs. Freeman; as ugly as the black ones of Lady Chandos."
"I do not think widows' bonnets ugly," was the reply of Mrs. Freeman. "To some faces they are particularly becoming."
"They are so ugly, so disfiguring, that I hope it will be long before I am called upon to wear them," returned Mrs. Chandos, speaking impulsively. "Were my husband to die—but there! I know what you want to say; why do I dwell upon trifles such as bonnets, when heavy calamities are on the house?"
"Suppose you walk about the gallery, my dear?" suggested Mrs. Freeman. "I see no chance of the rain's leaving off."
"No, I'll go back and take my things off, and play with pussy. Poor pussy wanted a walk in the grounds as much as I did. Oh,"—with a shriek—"it's gone!"
For the kitten, allured, perhaps, by the attractions of a promenade in the grounds, had leaped from the arms of Mrs. Chandos on to a shrub below. I saw it from my window. The shriek brought out Mr. Chandos from the house; he looked up.
"My kitten, Harry," she said. "It has flown away from me. Get it, will you? But I am sorry to give you the trouble."
Mr. Chandos took the kitten from the bush and once more looked up; at my window as well as at theirs.
"Who will come for it? Will you, Miss Hereford?—and oblige my—oblige Mrs. Chandos."
Oblige my what? Was he going to say 'sister-in-law' when he suddenly stopped himself? But, if so, why should he have stopped himself? And how could she be his sister-in-law? Were she the wife of Sir Thomas, she would be Lady Chandos; and Emily had said her brother Thomas was not married. She had said she had but two brothers, Thomas and Harry; who, then, was this young Mrs. Chandos? That she had a husband living was apparent, from the conversation I had just heard; and I had imagined all along that she must be the daughter-in-law of Lady Chandos.