ck and fastened in heavy coils low down on her neck,
giving to her a very girlish appearance, as Morris thought, for he could
see her now, and while she dried her feet he looked at her eagerly,
wondering that the fierce storm she had encountered had left so few
traces upon her face. Just about the mouth there was a deep-cut line,
but this was all; the remainder of the face was fair and smooth as in
her early girlhood, and far more beautiful, just as her character was
lovelier, and more to be admired.

Morris had done well to wait if he could win her now. Perhaps he thought
so, too, and this was why his spirits became so gay as he kept talking
to her, suggesting at last that she should stay to tea. The rain was
falling in torrents when he made the proposition. She could not go then,
even had she wished it, and though it was earlier than his usual tea
time, Morris at once rang for Mrs. Hull, and ordered that tea be served
in there as soon as possible.

"I ought not to stay. It is not proper, and my cap at home, too," Katy
kept thinking as she fidgeted in her chair, and watched the girl
setting the table so cosily for two, and occasionally deferring some
debatable point to her as if she were mistress there.

"Shall we have some thin slices of cold chicken to go with the jelly?"
she asked, looking at Katy, who answered in the affirmative, wishing she
was at home, and deploring again the absence of her cap.

"You can go now, Reekie," Morris said, when the boiling water was poured
into the silver kettle, and tea was on the table. "If we need you we
will ring."

With a vague wonder as to who would toast the doctor's bread and butter
it, Reekie departed, and the two were left together. It was Katy who
toasted the bread, kneeling upon the marble hearth, nearly blistering
her hands, burning her face and scorching the bread in her nervousness
at the novel position in which she so unexpectedly found herself. It was
Katy, too, who prepared Morris' tea, and tried to eat, but could not.
She was not hungry, she said, and the custard was the only thing she
tasted, besides the tea, which she sipped at frequent intervals, so as
to make Morris think she was eating more than she was. But Morris was
not deceived, nor yet disheartened. Possibly she suspected his
intention, and if so, the sooner he reached the point the better. So
when the tea equipage was put away, and she began again to speak of
going home, he said:

"No, Katy, you ca