Kate frowned, then laughed constrainedly.
"Don't worry, aunt," she replied, rising, and just touching her aunt's lips with her own. "I still think it would be different out there; but—I suppose you 'll always remain unconvinced, for I shall never have the chance to prove it. My plates won't belong anywhere but in Hopkinsville cupboards! Come, will you play to me?"
When Mrs. Rowland returned from England, one of the first letters she received after reaching home was a cordial invitation from her dead brother's daughter, Kate, to visit her.
In the last five years Mrs. Howland had seen her niece but once. That was during the sad, hurried days just following Mr. Merton's sudden death four years before. Since then Mrs. Howland had been abroad and there had been many changes at the little farmhouse in Hopkinsville. The farm had been sold, and Kate had married and had gone to Boston to live. Beyond the facts that Kate's husband was older than she, and was a man of considerable means, Mrs. Howland knew little of her niece's present circumstances. It was with curiosity, as well as pleasure, that she accepted Kate's invitation, and took the train specified.
At the South Station Mrs. Howland found a stylishly gowned, smiling young woman with a cordial welcome. An imposing carriage with a liveried coachman waited to take her to Kate's home.
"Oh, what handsome horses!" cried Mrs. Howland appreciatively, as she stepped into the carriage.
"Yes, are n't they," agreed Kate. "If only they matched better, they'd be perfect. I wish both had stars on their foreheads!"
"Let me see, you are on Beacon Street, I believe," remarked Mrs.
Howland, as the carriage left the more congested quarter of the city.
Kate frowned. "Yes," she answered. "I wanted Commonwealth Avenue, but Mr. Blake preferred Beacon. All his people live on Beacon, and have for years."
"Oh, but Beacon is lovely, I think."
"Do you? Well, perhaps; but Commonwealth is so much wider and more roomy. I could breathe on Commonwealth Avenue, I think!"
"And don't you, where you are?" laughed Mrs. Howland.
Her niece made a playfully wry face.
"Just pant—upon my word I do! Not one full breath do I draw," she asserted.
"Hm-m; I've always understood that deep breathing was necessary for health," commented Mrs. Howland, with a critical, comprehensive glance; "but—you seem to thrive all right! You are looking well, Kate."
"I don't feel so. I have the most shocking headaches," the other retorted. "Ah, here we are!"
Mrs. Howland followed her hostess up a short flight of stone steps into a handsome hall. A well-trained maid was at once in attendance, and another, a little later, helped her unpack.
"My dear," Mrs. Howland said to her niece when she came downstairs, "what a lucky woman you are to have two such maids! They are treasures!"
Kate's hands flew to her head with a gesture of despair.
"Maids!—Aunt Ellen, don't ever say the word to me, I beg! I never keep one more than a month, and I'm shaking in my shoes this very minute. There's a new cook in the kitchen, and I have n't the least idea what your dinner will be."
"I 'm not a bit worried," rejoined Mrs. Howland. "What a pretty home you have, Kate," she added, tactfully changing the subject.
"Think so? I'm glad you like it. I sometimes wish I could get hold of the man who built this house, though, and give him a piece of my mind. The rooms on this floor are so high studded they give me the shivers, while all the chambers are so low they are absurd. Did n't you notice it in your room?"
"Why—no; I don't think I did."
"Well, you will now."
"Perhaps so, since you have told me to," returned Mrs. Howland, a curious smile on her lips.
The dinner was well planned, well cooked, and well served, in Mrs. Howland's opinion, though to her niece it was none of the three. Kate's husband, the Honorable Eben Blake, proved to be a genial, distinguished-looking man who welcomed Mrs. Howland with the cordiality that he displayed toward anybody or anything connected in the most remote degree with his wife. It was evidently with sincere regrets that he made his apologies after dinner, and left the house with a plea of business.
"It's always that way when I want him!" exclaimed Kate petulantly. "Then night after night when I don't want him he'll stay at home and read and smoke."
"But you have friends—you go out," hazarded Mrs. Howland.
Mrs. Blake raised her eyebrows.
"Oh, of course! But, after all, what do calls and receptions amount to? You always meet the same people who say the same things, whether you go to see them or they come to see you."
Mrs. Howland laughed; then she said, softly,
"The old, old story, Kate—the crumbs on the plates."
"What?" demanded the younger woman in frank amazement. There was a moment's pause during which she gazed blankly into her aunt's eyes. "Oh!—that?" she added, coloring painfully; then she uptilted her chin. "You are very much mistaken, auntie," she resumed with some dignity. "It is nothing of the sort. I am very happy—very happy, indeed!"—positively. "I have a good husband, a pretty home, more money than is good for me, and—well, everything," she finished a little breathlessly.
Again Mrs. Howland laughed, but her face grew almost instantly grave.
"And yet, my dear," she said gently, "scarcely one thing has been mentioned since I came that was quite right."
"Oh, Aunt Ellen, how can you say such a dreadful thing!"
"Listen," replied Mrs. Howland; "it's little bits of things that you don't think of. It has grown on you without your realizing it: the horses did n't both have stars; the house was n't on Commonwealth Avenue; the rooms are too high or too low studded; the roast was over-done; your husband could n't"—
"Oh, auntie, auntie, I beg of you!"—interrupted Kate hysterically.
"Are you convinced, then?"
Kate shook her head. "I can't, auntie—I can't believe it!" she cried. "It—it can't be like that always. There must have been special things to-day that plagued me. Auntie, I'm not such a—monster!"
"Hm-m; well—will you consent to an experiment to—er—find out?"
"Indeed I will!" returned Kate promptly.
"Very good! Every time I hear those little dissatisfied fault-findings, I am going to mention crumbs or plates or china. I think you'll understand. Is it a bargain?"
"It's a bargain," agreed Kate, and she smiled confidently.
The rest of the evening Mrs. Blake kept close guard over her tongue. Twice a "but" and once an "only" slipped out; but she bit her lips and completed her sentence in another way in each case, and if Mrs. Howland noticed, she made no sign.
It rained the next morning. Kate came into the dining-room with a frown.
"I'm so sorry, auntie," she sighed. "I'd planned a drive this morning. It always rains when I want to do something, but when I don't, it just shines and shines, week in and week out."
"Won't the rain wash the—plates?" asked Mrs. Howland in a low voice, as she passed her niece's chair.
"Wha-at?" demanded Mrs. Blake; then she flushed scarlet. "Weather doesn't count," she finished flippantly.
"No? Oh!" smiled Mrs. Howland.
"Fine muffins, these!" spoke up Mr. Blake,