Mrs. Douglas turns suddenly very white. Her eyes flash their eager scrutiny at her daughter's face.
"What nonsense! Here—and to-day? It is impossible. I must send a message."
"Stay, mother." The girl lays her hand on her mother's arm, and her voice trembles a little. "Don't send any message. Let him come. He will be here just when we come back from the church.
"I should like to see my old playmate, and receive his congratulations on such a day as this. We were always like brother and sister, you know. He will be delighted with my future prospects, I am sure—though I feel rather like the servants who leave an old place 'to better themselves,' and are not quite sure how they will get on in the new. Oh, do let him come! It is just the one thing wanting to make my wedding perfect."
Mrs. Douglas looks at her with puzzled wonder. "I don't quite understand you," she says uncomfortably. "You really wish Keith Athelstone to come here, knowing nothing of the altered circumstances? It will be horribly unpleasant. There will be a scene, and you know I detest scenes. They are such bad form."
"There will be no scene," Lauraine says very quietly. "I think you know me better than that. And it is the last thing I ask of you, before I leave your house to-day. Let him come."
She speaks calmly enough, but a feverish flush glows in her cheek, and her eyes look up at her mother's face more in command than in entreaty.
"Oh! if you put it like that," Mrs. Douglas says, with a pretty pretence of feeling that Lauraine regards with scornful amusement, "I cannot deny you. Let it be so, then. I only hope he will behave himself. He was always so dreadfully impetuous and hot-headed. That Spanish mother of his is to blame for that. Well, my darling, it is a charming day for your wedding, and if you are ready for breakfast come down to my boudoir. You will find me there. By the way, would you mind giving me that letter to read? I should like to see what he says."
Lauraine hands it to her, and an odd little smile comes over her lips.
"If we had not been quite so much like brother and sister," she says, "and if you hadn't been quite so determined to marry me this season, Keith would have been a pretty good match after all."