I heard Mrs. Somers say at breakfast, as I went in, “We are to lose Miss Cassandra on Wednesday.”  I looked at Desmond, who was munching toast abstractedly.  He made a motion for me to take the chair beside him, which I obeyed.  Ben saw this movement, and an expression of pain passed over his face.  At that instant I remembered that Desmond’s being seen in the evening and in the morning was a rare occurrence.  Mr. Somers took up the remark of Mrs. Somers where she had left it, and expatiated on it till breakfast was over, so courteously and so ramblingly that I was convinced the affair Ben had at heart had been revealed.  He invited me to go to church, and he spent the whole of the evening in the parlor; and although Desmond hovered near me all day and all the evening, we had no opportunity of speaking to each other.

CHAPTER XXXII.

On Tuesday morning Adelaide sent out invitations to a farewell entertainment, as she called it, for Tuesday evening.  Mrs. Somers, affecting great interest in it, engaged my services in wiping the dust from glass and china; “too valuable,” she said, “for servants to handle.”  We spent a part of the morning in the dining-room and pantry.  Ann was with us.  If she went out, Mrs. Somers was silent; when present she chatted.  While we were busy Desmond came in, in riding trousers and whip in hand.

“What nonsense!” he said, touching my hand with the whiplash.  “Will you ride with me after dinner?”

“I must have the horses at three o’clock,” said his mother, “to go to Mrs. Flint’s funeral.  She was a family friend, you know.”  The funeral could not be postponed, even for Desmond; but he grew ill-humored at once, swore at Murphy, who was packing a waiter at the sideboard, for rattling the plates; called Ann a minx, because she laughed at him; and bit a cigar to pieces because he could not light it.  Rash had followed him, his nose against his velveteens, in entreaty to go with him; I was pleased at this sign of amity between them.  At a harder push than common he looked down and kicked him away.

“Noble creature,” I said, “try your whip on him.  Rash, go to your master,” and I opened the door.  Two smaller dogs, Desmond’s property, made a rush to come in; but I shut them out, whereat they whined so loudly that Mrs. Somers was provoked to attack him for bringing his dogs in the house.  An altercation took place, and was ended by Desmond declaring that he was on his way after a bitch terrier, to bring it home.  He went out, giving me a look from the door, which I answered with a smile that made him stamp all the way through the hall.  Mrs. Somers’s feelings as she heard him peeped out at me.  Groaning in spirit, I finished my last saucer and betook myself to my room and read, till summoned by Mrs. Somers to a consultation respecting the furniture coverings.  Desmond came home, but spoke to no one, hovering in my vicinity as on the day before.