Viviette freed herself from Katherine's touch.
"Oh, no, you didn't. You didn't understand anything. You didn't try to. You are all lying. The three of you. You have all lied, and lied, and lied to me. I tell you to your faces you have lied to me." She swung passionately to each in turn. "'Austin can never be anything to me but a friend'--how often have you said that to me? Ah--Saint Nitouche! And you"--to Austin--"How dared you insult me this morning? And you--how have you dared to insult me all the time? You've lied--the whole lot of you--and I hate you all!"
Mrs. Ware had risen, scared and trembling.
"What does the girl mean? I've never heard such unladylike words in a drawing-room in my life."
Dick blundered in: "It's all my fault, mother--"
"I've not the slightest doubt of that," returned the old lady with asperity. "But what Austin and Katherine have to do with it I can't imagine."
The servant opened the door.
"Lord Banstead."
He entered a cold, strange silence. Everyone had forgotten him. He must have attributed the ungenial atmosphere to his own lateness--it was half-past eight--for he made penitent apology to Mrs. Ware. Austin greeted him coldly. Dick nodded absently from the other side of the room. Viviette, with a sweeping glance of defiance at the assembled family, held herself very erect, and with hard eyes and quivering lips came straight to the young fellow.
"Lord Banstead," she said. "You have asked me four times to marry you. Did you mean it, or were you lying, too?"