“Please tell John to bring Peggy around early enough to-night so we can go down and get the Greggorys. I told them we'd call for them.”
“That's good. Won't you repent and go, too?”
“So'm I. Good-by,” sighed Aunt Hannah, as she hung up the receiver and turned away.
It was after five o'clock when Billy got home, and so hurried were the dressing and the dinner that Aunt Hannah forgot to mention Bertram's telephone call till just as Billy was ready to start for the Greggorys'.
“There! and I forgot,” she confessed. “Bertram called you up just after you left this morning, my dear.”
“Did he?” Billy's face was turned away, but Aunt Hannah did not notice that.
“Yes. Oh, he didn't want anything special,” smiled the lady, “only--well, he did ask if you were all right this morning,” she finished with quiet mischief.
“Did he?” murmured Billy again. This time there was a little sound after the words, which Aunt Hannah would have taken for a sob if she had not known that it must have been a laugh.
At eight o'clock the doorbell rang, and a minute later Rosa came up to say that Mr. Bertram Henshaw was down-stairs and wished to see Mrs. Stetson.
“Why, my dear boy,” she exclaimed, as she entered the room; “Billy said you had a banquet on for to-night!”
“Yes, I know; but--I didn't go.” Bertram's face was pale and drawn. His voice did not sound natural.
“Why, Bertram, you look ill! _Are_ you ill?” The man made an impatient gesture.
“No, no, I'm not ill--I'm not ill at all. Rosa says--Billy's not here.”
“No; she's gone to the opera with the Greggorys.”
“The _opera!_” There was a grieved hurt in Bertram's voice that Aunt Hannah quite misunderstood. She hastened to give an apologetic explanation.
“Yes. She would have told you--she would have asked you to join them, I'm sure, but she said you were going to a banquet. I'm _sure_ she said so.”
“Yes, I did tell her so--last night,” nodded Bertram, dully.
Aunt Hannah frowned a little. Still more anxiously she endeavored to explain to this disappointed lover why his sweetheart was not at home to greet him.
“Well, then, of course, my boy, she'd never think of your coming here to-night; and when she found Mr. Arkwright was going to sing--”
“Arkwright!” There was no listlessness in Bertram's voice or manner now.
