But the good old lady never dreamed of shocking any one with her
attempts at fashion; and curtseying very low to Mr. Cameron, she hoped
for a better acquaintance, and then took her seat at the table, just
where each movement could be distinctly seen by Wilford, scanning her so
intently as scarcely to hear the reverent words with which Morris asked
a blessing upon themselves and the food so abundantly prepared. They
could hardly have gotten through that first dinner without Morris, who
adroitly tried to divert Wilford's mind from what was passing around
him. But with all his vigilance he could not prevent his hearing Aunt
Betsy as, in an aside to Helen, she denounced the heavy fork she was
awkwardly trying to use, first expressing her surprise at finding it by
her plate instead of the smaller one to which she was accustomed.

"The land! if you didn't borry Morris' forks! I'd as soon eat with the
toastin' iron," she said, in a tone of distress, but Helen's foot
touching hers warned her to keep silence, which she did after that, and
the dinner proceeded quietly, Wilford discovering ere its close that
Mrs. Lennox, now that she was more composed, had really some pretensions
to a lady, while Helen's dress and collar ceased to be obnoxious, as he
watched the play of her fine features and saw her eyes kindle as she
took a modest part in the conversation when it turned on books and
literature.

Meanwhile Katy kept very still, her cheeks flushing and her eyes cast
down whenever she met Wilford's gaze; but when, after dinner was over
and Morris had gone, she went with him down to the shore of the pond,
her tongue was loosed, and Wilford found again the little fairy who had
so bewitched him a few weeks before. And yet there was a load upon his
mind--a shadow made by the actual knowledge that between Katy's family