“I wonder if any of the others will be there,” said Katie. She was somewhat elated, although she was suspicious, and in a state of half resistance to Mrs. Stone and the rival Frank, whose rivalry the little schemer felt by instinct. As for Lucy, the object of all this plotting, she suspected nothing. She even felt a little guilty in the pleasure to which she looked forward. To be asked to Mrs. Stone’s room to tea on Sunday evening was a distinction of which all the girls were proud. It was like an invitation from the queen, a command which was not to be disregarded; but yet she had a little uneasiness in her mind, thinking of her little brother, who would be disappointed. Even for Mrs. Stone, the sovereign of this small world, she did not like to break faith with little Jock. CHAPTER XI. AN AFTERNOON TEA. Mrs. Stone’s room was fitted up in the latest, which I need not say is far from being the newest fashion. It would indeed have been an insult to her to say that anything in it was new. Mr. Morris had only just begun to reign over the homes of the æsthetic classes; but Mrs. Stone was well in advance of her age, and her walls were covered with a very large pattern of acanthus-leaves in several shades of green, with curtains as nearly as possible the same in design and color. She had a number of plates hung about the walls instead of pictures, and here and there gleaming shelves and little cabinets full of china, which were a great relief and comfort to the eye. Her chairs were Chippendale, need it be said? and held her visitors upright in a dignified height and security. The room had but one window, which was large, but half-filled with designs in glass, and half overshadowed with a great lime-tree, which was delightful in summer, but in February not so delightful. The fire was at the end of the room, and the room was somewhat dark, especially in the afternoon. When the two girls went in several persons were dimly visible seated in those large and solemn Chippendalian chairs, with hands reposing upon the arms of them, ranged against the walls like Egyptian gods. The color of one of those figures, though faint in the gloom, was that of Miss Southwood’s gray velveteen, her ordinary afternoon dress, and therefore recognizable; but the others in masculine black clothes, with only a vague whiteness for their faces, were mysterious as Isis and Osiris; and so was a lady with her veil over her face, who sat at the other side of the fireplace, with the air of a chairwoman at a meeting, high and stately; though she caught a little of the pale afternoon daylight upon her, yet her dark dress and seal-skin coat and veil prevented any distinctness of revelation. In this correct and carefully arranged parlor there was one weak point. A woman who is without caprice is unworthy of being called a woman. Instead of herself occupying a Chippendale chair, and having her tea-tray placed upon the