"No more than usual, my lord," said the elegant functionary in black, who was about to announce him, with a bland and soft smile of superiority and a little pity like his master's for the man who knew no better, "Two or three gentlemen have dropped in to lunch." The drawing-room was a large room, with a huge round bow-window giving upon the loch. It was furnished and decorated in the most approved manner, with quantities of pretty things of every costly description: for Katie, like her father, betrayed the constitution and temperament of wealth, by loving cost almost more than beauty. She was, however, too well instructed to be led into the mistake of making that luxurious modern room into the semblance of anything ancient or faded, while Mr. Williamson was too fond of everything bright and fresh to be persuaded even by fashion into such an anachronism. There was a faint suspicion in the mirrors and gilding and all the conveniences and luxuries, of the style of grandeur peculiar to the saloon of a splendid steamer, to which the steam-yacht, which was the chief object in the immediate prospect as seen from the plate-glass window, gave additional likelihood. Walter for his part was strangely startled, when, out of the seriousness of his own lonely thoughts, and the sense of having arrived at a great crisis, he suddenly stepped into the flutter and talk of this large assembly, which was composed of some half-dozen neighbours on the loch, most of them young men in more or less attendance upon Katie, mingled with strangers of all classes whom Mr. Williamson had picked up here and there. There was a little pause in the hum of voices at his own name, and a slight stir of interest, various of the guests turning round to look as he came in. The master of the house advanced with a large hand held out, and an effusive welcome; but the little lady of Birkenbraes paid Walter the much greater compliment of pursuing her conversation undisturbed, without betraying by a movement that she knew he was there. Katie was not rude. It was not her habit to pay so little attention to a new-comer: she was profoundly conscious of his entrance, and of every step he made among the groups distributed about; but as the matter was a little serious, and his appearance of some importance, she showed a slight stir of mind and thoughts, which could scarcely be called agitation, in this way. It was only when her father called loudly, "Katie, Katie, do you not see Lord Erradeen?" that she turned, not moving from her place, and suddenly held out her hand with a smile.