“I am the culprit, my Lady,” said Kate, approaching with all the quiet stateliness of her peculiar manner. “I have routed this gorgeous assembly, shocked your most distinguished guests, and horrified all whose sentiments breathe loyalty! I am sincerely sorry for my offence; and it is a grave one.” “_You--you_ have dared to do this?” “Too true, madam,” rejoined Kate. “How and to whom have you had the insolence--” She stopped, overcome by passion; and Kate replied,--“To all who pleased to listen, my Lady, I have said what doubtless is not often uttered in such choice company, but what, if I mistake not greatly, their ears will grow familiar with erelong.” “Nay, nay,” said the Duchess, in a tone of apology, “the matter is not so serious as all this. Every one now is terrified. This disturbance, the soldiery, the vast crowds that beset the streets, have all produced so much excitement that even a few words spoken at random are enough to cause fear. It is one of Kate's fancies to terrorize thus over weak minds. She has the cruel triumph of not knowing what fear is. In a word, it is a mere trifling event, sure to be forgotten in the midst of such scenes as we are passing through.” This attempt at explanation, poured forth with rapid utterance, did not produce on Lady Dorothea the conviction it was intended to impose, and her Ladyship received the last adieus of the Duchess with a cold and stately formality; and then, as the door closed after her, turned to Kate Henderson, and said,--“I want _your_ explanation of all this. Let me have it.” “It is easily given, my Lady,” said Kate, calmly. And then, in a voice that never trembled nor varied, she narrated briefly the scene which had just occurred, not extenuating in the slightest her own share in the transaction, or offering a single syllable of excuse. “And you, being who and what you are, dared thus to outrage the best blood of France!” exclaimed Lady Dorothea, trembling all over with passion. “Perhaps, my Lady, if I sought for an apology, it would be in the fact of being who and what I am.” “And do you imagine that after conduct such as this, after exposing me to a partnership in the shame that attaches to yourself, that you are any longer to enjoy the shelter of my roof?” “It never occurred to me to think of that, madam,” said Kate, with an ill-repressed scorn. “Then it is for _me_ to remind you of it,” said her Ladyship, sternly. “You shall, first of all, write me an humble apology for this vulgar tirade, this outrage upon my company, and then you shall leave the house. Sit down there, and write as I shall dictate to you.” Kate seated herself with an air of implicit obedience at a writing-table, and took up a pen.