e thrust it away in the folds of her dress. The
travellers had returned.
With a resolutely smiling face she went to meet them.
CHAPTER II
THE NEW MISTRESS
"Here is our dear Sylvia!" said Mrs. Ingleton.
She embraced the girl with much _empressement_, and then, before
Sylvia could reach her father, turned and embraced him herself.
"So very nice to be home, dear!" she said effusively. "We shall be
very happy here."
Gilbert Ingleton bestowed a somewhat embarrassed salute upon her,
one eye on his daughter. She greeted him sedately the next moment,
and though her face was smiling, her welcome seemed to be frozen at
its source; it held no warmth.
Mrs. Ingleton, tall, handsome, assertive, cast an appraising eye
around the oak-panelled hall. "Dear me! What severe splendour!"
she commented. "I have a great love for cosiness myself. We must
scatter some of those sweet little Italian ornaments about,
Gilbert. You won't know the place when I have done with it. I am
going to take you all in hand and bring you up-to-date."
Her keen dark eyes rested upon her step-daughter with a smile of
peculiar meaning. Sylvia met them with the utmost directness.
"We like simplicity," she said.
Mrs. Ingleton pursed her lips, "Oh, but there is simplicity and
simplicity! Give me warmth, homeliness, and plenty of pretty
things. This place is archaically cold--quite like a convent. And
you, my dear, might be the Sister Superior from your air. Now,
Gilbert darling, you and I are going to be very firm with this
child. I can plainly see she needs a guiding hand. She has had
much too much responsibility for so young a girl. We are going to
alter all that. We are going to make her very happy--as well as
good."
She tapped Sylvia's shoulder with smiling significance, looking at
her husband to set his seal to the declaration.
Mr. Ingleton was obviously feeling very uncomfortable. He glanced
at Sylvia almost appealingly.
"I hope we are all going to be happy," he said rather gruffly.
"Don't see why we shouldn't be, I'm sure. I like a quiet life
myself. Got some tea for us, Sylvia?"
Sylvia turned, stiffly unresponsive to her step-mother's
blandishments. "This way," she said, and crossed the hall to the
drawing-room.
It was a beautiful room aglow just then with the rays of the
western sun. Mrs. Ingleton looked all around her with smiling
criticism, and nodded to herself as if seeing her way to many
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