Family Pride

She had come up to him now, and was standing behind him, with her hands upon his shoulder; so she did not see the expression of his face as he answered quickly; "Yes, yes."

A moment after he quitted the room, and it was then that Katy, standing before the window, charged the day with what was strictly Wilford's fault. Returning at last to her chair she went off into a reverie as to the new home to which she was going and the new friends she was to meet, wondering much what they would think of her, and wondering most if they would like her. Once she had said to Wilford: "Which of your sisters shall I like best?"

And Wilford had answered her by asking: "Which do you like best, books or going to parties in full dress?"

"Oh, parties and dress," Katy had said, and Wilford had then rejoined: "You will like Juno best, for she is all fashion and gayety, while Bluebell prefers her books and the quiet of her own room."

Katy felt afraid of Bell, and in fact, now that they were so near, she felt afraid of them all, notwithstanding Esther's assurances that they could not help loving her. During the six months they had been together Esther had learned to feel for her young lady that strong affection which sometimes exists between mistress and servant. Everything which she could do for her she did, smoothing as much as possible the meeting which she also dreaded, for though the Camerons were too proud to express before her their opinion of Wilford's choice, she had guessed it readily, and pitied the young wife brought up with ideas so different from those of her husband's family. More accustomed to Wilford's moods than Katy, she saw that something was the matter, and it prompted her to unusual attentions, stirring the fire into a still more cheerful blaze and bringing a stool for Katy, who in blissful ignorance of her husband's real feelings, sat waiting his return from the telegraph office, whither she supposed he had gone, and building pleasant pictures of to-morrow's meeting with her mother and Helen, and possibly Dr. Morris, if not Uncle Ephraim himself.

The voyage home had been long and wearisome, and Katy, who had suffered from seasickness, was feeling jaded and tired, wishing, as she told Esther, that instead of going to New York direct she could go straight to the farmhouse and "rest on mother's bed," that receptacle for all her childish ills.

"I mean to ask Wilford if I may," she said to herself, and her cheeks grew brighter as she thought of really going home to mother and Helen and the kind old people who would pet and love her so much.