‘You are altered,’ he said, somewhat coldly; and then, ‘I understood from your aunt that you lived very quietly, saw nobody——’
‘Nobody but our friends,’ explained Kate.
‘Friends! I suppose you think everybody that looks pleasant is your friend. Good lack! good lack!’ said the Mentor. ‘Why, this is society—this is dissipation. A season in town would be nothing to it.’
Kate laughed. She thought it a very good joke; and not the faintest idea crossed her mind that her uncle might mean what he said.
‘Why, there are four, five, six grown-up young men,’ he said, standing still and counting them as they came in sight of the lawn. ‘What is that but dissipation? And what are they all doing idle about here? Six young men! And who is that girl who is so unhappy, Kate?’
‘The girl who is unhappy, uncle?’ Kate changed colour; the instinct of concealment came to her at once, though the stranger could have no way of knowing that there was anything to conceal. ‘Oh! I see,’ she added. ‘You mean my cousin Ombra. She is not quite well; that is why she looks so pale.’
‘I am not easily deceived,’ he said. ‘Look here, Kate, I am a keen observer. She is unhappy, and you are in her way.’
‘I, uncle!’
‘You need not be indignant. You, and no other. I saw her before you left your agreeable companions yonder. I think, Kate, you had better do your packing and come away with me.’
‘With you, uncle?’