Poor Stella looked up at her sister with distracted eyes. “Oh, Kate, what does she mean? What does she mean?” she cried.
“We don’t want to know what she means,” cried Katherine, putting her arms round her sister. “She speaks her own language, not one that we understand. Stella, Stella dear, don’t take any notice. What are the men in the clubs to you?”
“I’d like to know,” said Mrs. Seton with a laugh, “which of us can afford to think like that of the men in the clubs. Why, it’s there that everything comes from. A good joke or a good story, that’s what they live by—they tell each other everything! Who would care to have them, or who would ask them out, and stand their impudence if they hadn’t always the very last bit of gossip at their fingers’ ends? And this is such a delicious story, don’t you know? Charlie Somers and Algy Scott off in a little pleasure yacht with a millionaire’s daughter, and kept her out all night, by Jove, in a gale of wind to make everything nice! And now the thing is to see how far the old father will go. He’ll have to do something big, don’t you know? but whether Charlie or Algy is to be the happy man——”
“Kate!” said Stella with a scream, hiding her head on her sister’s shoulder. “Take me away! Oh, hide me somewhere! Don’t let me see anyone—anyone! Oh, what have I done—what have I done, that anything so dreadful should come to me.”
“You have done nothing, Stella, except a little folly, childish folly, that meant nothing. Will you let her alone, please? You have done enough harm here. It was you who brought those—those very vulgar young men to this house.”
Even Stella lifted her tearful face in consternation at Katherine’s boldness, and Mrs. Seton uttered a shriek of dismay.
“What next—what next? Vulgar young men! The very flower of the country, the finest young fellows going. You’ve taken leave of your senses, I think. And to this house—oh, my goodness, what fun it is!—how they will laugh! To this house——”
“They had better not laugh in our hearing at least. This house is sacred to those who live in it, and anyone who comes here with such hideous miserable gossip may be prepared for a bad reception. Those vulgar cads!” cried Katherine. “Oh, that word is vulgar too, I suppose. I don’t care—they are so if any men ever were, who think they can trifle with a girl’s name and make her father come down—with what? his money you mean—it would be good sound blows if I were a man. And for what? to buy the miserable beings off, to shut their wretched mouths, to——”
“Katherine!” cried Stella, all aglow, detaching herself from her sister’s arms.
“Here’s heroics!” said Mrs. Seton; but she was overawed more or less by the flashing eyes and imposing aspect of this young woman, who was no “frump” after all, as appeared, but a person to be reckoned with—not Stella’s duenna, but something in her own right. Then she turned to Stella, who was more comprehensible, with whom a friend might quarrel and make it up again and no harm done. “My dear,” she said, “you are the one of this family who understands a little, who can be spoken to—I shan’t notice the rude things your sister says—I was obliged to tell you, for it’s always best to hear from a friend what is being said about you outside. You might have seen yourself boycotted, don’t you know? and not known what it meant. But, I dare say, if we all stand by you, you’ll not be boycotted for very long. You don’t mean to be rude, I hope, to your best friends.”