Hope paused in the midst of the tumult of burning nuts to listen. Her father glanced at her quickly with an eye which presaged a storm. Hope drew herself up and defied it.
“I have been in Mrs Buchanan’s since the morning—do you know her, Mrs Oswald?”
“Yes, I know her,” said Mrs Oswald, quietly, with secret satisfaction, only less warm than Hope’s. “Mrs Buchanan is an old friend of mine. You liked her, no doubt?”
“Perhaps one must be alone as I have been,” said Lilias, faltering slightly, “before one can know what a pleasure it is—I mean, to be in the atmosphere of a mother; but Hope’s Helen, Mrs Oswald—I wonder I have been here so long, and have not heard of her before.”
“That will be the Miss Buchanan that keeps the school,” interrupted Miss Maxwell of Firthside.
Lilias smiled.
“If you knew her you would not need that distinction, though it is a very good one; but one runs no risk of losing her, Miss Maxwell, though all the other Miss Buchanans in Scotland were congregated in Fendie.”
“Oh, is she so pretty?” asked the young lady, with some curiosity.
William Oswald stood at some distance, leaning upon the mantelpiece. At his feet little Agnes Elliot looked up, vainly pleading that he would put those two nuts, representing herself and Harry Stewart of Fairholm, into some safe corner of the ruddy fire; but William had no ear for little Agnes.
The banker sat in a great chair near his wife’s sofa, looking, as he wished it to appear, towards the young merrymakers round the fire-place, and pretending to be extremely indifferent to the conversation, but listening with all his might.