"I say, Kate, what a clumsy elephant you are. You'll bring down the chandelier and a torrent of abuse from a certain person at the same time."
"Where are Ralph and Cyril?" Kate asked.
"Downstairs. We have all been 'preparing a lesson,' doing a holiday task. Such humbug, as if fellows of our age ought not to dine late."
"Well, the Barrington boys always have school-room tea."
"They are younger. Ned isn't fifteen, and I am sixteen."
"No, not quite; not till next week," Kate said. "You are younger than Raymond. Are you not sorry for them at Maplestone?"
"Awfully," said Digby; "and I think every one so unfeeling. You girls ought to be in mourning."
"Mamma said it would be too expensive," said Kate; "but then she never expected they would all come here and see us. I believe she is going to get up something if they do come; but they may not get lodgings. Isn't it odd, Digby, to think of our visit to Maplestone a year and a half ago, when we felt them so much better off than we were, and envied the house and the gardens, and the ponies and the carriages? And Raymond talked so much of his swell Eton friends; and Reginald was at Rugby; and you grumbled because you could not go to school, but had to be a day boy at the college here."
"Yes, I remember," said Digby. "And how pretty Ada looked when she went to church on Sunday. And that quiet one, they say, is clever, with the queer name."
"Salome! ah, yes," said Kate. "She was odd—so dreamy, and unlike other girls. Dear me, it is very sad for them all. I wish they were not coming here all the same, for I know they will be disappointed; and Roxburgh is not a place to be poor in. I am sick of all the talking about who this person is, and where they come from, and what they wear; and that 'residents' can't know 'lodgers' for fear of getting mixed up with what is not quite the thing. I do hate it," said Kate vehemently; "and yet what is one to do?"