‘Not when it is true?’ said the remorseless Kate.
And then the whole group came to a pause, Bertie standing open-mouthed, most anxious to preserve the peace, but not knowing how. It was the judicious Edith who brought the crisis to a close by acting upon one of the maxims with which she was familiar as a teacher of youth.
‘Should you like to walk round the garden?’ she said, changing the subject with an adroitness which was very satisfactory to herself, ‘or come back into the drawing-room? There is not much to see in our little place, after your beautiful gardens at Langton-Courtenay; but still, if you would like to walk round—or perhaps you would prefer to go in and join mamma?’
‘My uncle must be ready to go now,’ said Kate, with responsive quickness, and she stalked in before them through the open window. As good luck would have it, Mr. Courtenay was just rising to take his leave. Kate followed him out, much subdued, in one sense, though all in arms in another. The girls were not nearly so nice as she thought they would be—reality was not equal to anticipation—and to think they should have quarrelled with her the very first time for nothing! This was the view of the matter which occurred to Kate.
CHAPTER VI.
I cannot undertake to say how it was, but it is certain that Bertie Hardwick met Kate next day, as she took her walk into the village, accompanied by Miss Blank. At the sight of him, that lady’s countenance clouded over; but Kate was glad, and the young man took no notice of Miss Blank’s looks. As it happened, the conversation between the governess and her pupil had flagged—it often flagged. The conversation between Kate and Miss Blank consisted generally of a host of bewildering questions on the one side, and as few answers as could be managed on the other. Miss Blank no doubt had affairs of her own to think of; and then Kate’s questions were of everything in heaven and earth, and might have troubled even a wise counsellor. Mr. Courtenay was still at Langton, but had sent out his niece for her usual walk—a thing by which she felt humiliated—and she had met with a rebuff in the village in consequence of some interference. She was in low spirits, and Miss Blank did not mind. Accordingly, Bertie was a relief and comfort to her, more than can be described.
‘Why don’t your sisters like me?’ said Kate. ‘I wonder, Mr. Bertie, why people don’t like me? If they would let me, I should like to be friends; but you saw they would not.’
‘I don’t think—perhaps—that they quite understood——’
‘But it is so easy to understand,’ said Kate, with a little impatient sigh. She shook her head, and tossed back her shining hair, which made an aureole round her. ‘Don’t let us speak of it,’ she said; ‘but you understood from the very first?’