h as Katy.

"What would they say at home if they could only see you?" Katy
exclaimed, throwing back the handsome cloak so as to show more of the
well-shaped neck, gleaming so white beneath it.

"Aunt Betsy would say I had forgotten half my dress," Helen replied,
blushing as she glanced at the uncovered arms, which never since her
childhood had been thus exposed to view, except at such times as her
household duties had required it.

Even this exception would not apply to the low neck, at which Helen long
demurred, yielding finally to Katy's entreaties, but often wondering
what Mark Ray would think, and if he would not be shocked. Mark Ray had
been strangely blended with all Helen's thoughts as she submitted
herself to Esther's practiced hands, and when the hairdresser, summoned
to her aid, asked what flowers she would wear, it was a thought of him
which led her to select a single water lily, which looked as natural as
if its bed had really been the bosom of Fairy Pond.

"Nothing else? Surely mademoiselle will have these few green leaves?"
Celine had said, but Helen would have nothing save the lily, which was
twined tastefully amid the heavy braids of the brown hair, whose length
and luxuriance had thrown the hairdresser into ecstasies of delight,
and made Esther lament that in these days of false tresses no one would
give Miss Lennox credit for what was wholly her own.

"You will be the belle of the evening," Katy said, as she kissed her
sister good-night and then ran back to her baby, while Wilford, yielding
to her importunities that he should not remain with her, followed Mrs.
Banker's carriage in his own private conveyance, and was soon set down
at Sybil Grandon's door.

Meanwhile, at the elder Cameron's there had been a discussion touching
the propriety of their taking Helen under their protection, instead of
leaving her to Mrs. Banker to chaperone, Bell insisting that it ought to
be done, while the father swore roundly at the imperious Juno, who would
not "be bothered with that country girl."

"You would rather leave her wholly to Mark Ray and his mother, I
suppose," Bell said, adding, as she saw the flush on Juno's face. "You
know you are dying of jealousy, and nothing annoys you so much as to
hear people talk of Mark's attentions to Miss Lennox."

"Do they talk?" Mrs. Cameron asked quickly, while in her gray eyes there
gleamed a light far more dangerous and threatening to Helen than Juno's
open scorn.