the rest of the day. There was something fascinating to her imagination
in the hovering mountain outline between sea and sky. She felt as if she
were under an engagement to be there to meet it, and she rarely missed
the appointment. Then, after Corsica had pulled the bright mists over
its face and melted from view, she would hurry with her dressing, and as
soon as was practicable set to work to make the _salon_ look bright
before the coffee and rolls should appear, a little after eight o'clock.
Mrs. Ashe always found the fire lit, the little meal cosily set out
beside it, and Katy's happy untroubled face to welcome her when she
emerged from her room; and the cheer of these morning repasts made a
good beginning for the day.

Then came walking and a French lesson, and a long sitting on the beach,
while Katy worked at her home letters and Amy raced up and down in the
sun; and then toward noon Lieutenant Ned generally appeared, and some
scheme of pleasure was set on foot. Mrs. Ashe ignored his evident
_penchant_ for Lilly Page, and claimed his time and attentions as hers
by right. Young Worthington was a good deal "taken" with the pretty
Lilly; still, he had an old-time devotion for his sister and the habit
of doing what she desired, and he yielded to her behests with no audible
objections. He made a fourth in the carriage while they drove over the
lovely hills which encircle Nice toward the north, to Cimiers and the
Val de St. Andre, or down the coast toward Ventimiglia. He went with
them to Monte-Carlo and Mentone, and was their escort again and again
when they visited the great war-ships as they lay at anchor in a bay
which in its translucent blue was like an enormous sapphire.

Mrs. Page and her daughter were included in these parties more than
once; but there was something in Mrs. Ashe's cool appropriation of her
brother which was infinitely vexatious to Lilly, who before her