"Riding in Central Park!" cried Hortense.

"Why--why, the child has nothing decent to wear," declared Belle. "How could she get a riding habit--or hire a horse? I do not understand this, Miss Stone, but I can tell you right now, that Helen has nothing fit to wear to your dinner party. She came here a little pauper--with nothing fit to wear in her trunk. Pa _did_ find money enough for a new street dress and hat for her; but he did not feel that he could support in luxury every pauper who came here and claimed relationship with him."

Miss Stone's mouth fairly hung open, and her eyes were as round as eyes could be, with wonder and surprise.

"What is this you tell me?" she murmured. "Helen Morrell a pauper?"

"I presume those people out there in Montana wanted to get the girl off their hands," said Belle, coldly, "and merely shipped her East, hoping that Pa would make provision for her. She has been a great source of annoyance to us, I do a.s.sure you."

"A source of annoyance?" repeated the caller.

"And why not? Without a rag decent to wear. With no money. Scarcely education enough to make herself intelligibly understood----"

Flossie began to giggle. But Jessie Stone rose to her feet. This volatile, talkative girl could be very dignified when she was aroused.

"You are speaking of _my_ friend, Helen Morrell," she interrupted Belle's flow of angry language, sternly. "Whether she is your cousin, or not, she is _my_ friend, and I will not listen to you talk about her in that way.

Besides, you must be crazy if you believe your own words! Helen Morrell poor! Helen Morrell uneducated!

"Why, Helen was four years in one of the best preparatory schools of the West--in Denver. Let me tell you that Denver is some city, too. And as for being poor and having nothing to wear--Why, whatever can you mean? She owns one of the few big ranches left in the West, with thousands upon thousands of cattle and horses upon it. And her father left her all that, and perhaps a quarter of a million in cash or investments beside."

"Not Helen?" shrieked Belle, sitting down very suddenly.

"Little Helen--_rich_?" murmured Hortense.

"Does Helen really _own_ Sunset Ranch?" cried Flossie, eagerly.

"She certainly does--every acre of it. Why, Dud knows all about her and all about her affairs. If you consider that girl poor and uneducated you have fooled yourselves nicely."

"I'm glad of it! I'm glad of it!" exclaimed Flossie, clapping her hands and pirouetting about the room. "Serves you right, Belle! _I_ found out she knew a whole lot more than I did, long ago. She's been helping me with my lessons."

"And she _is_ a nice little thing," joined in Hortense, "I don't care what you say to the contrary, Belle. She was the only one in this house that showed me any real sympathy when I was sick----"

Belle only looked at her sisters, but could say nothing.

"And if Helen hasn't anything fit to wear to your party to-morrow night, I will lend her something," declared Hortense.

"You need not bother," said Jess, scornfully. "If Helen came in the plainest and most miserable frock to be found she would be welcome.

Good-day to you, Miss Starkweather--and Miss Hortense--and Miss Flossie."

She swept out of the room and did not even need the gorgeous Gregson to show her to the door.

CHAPTER XXVII

THE PARTY

Helen chanced that evening to be entering the area door just as Mr.

Starkweather himself was mounting the steps of the mansion. Her uncle recognized the girl and scowled over the bal.u.s.trade at her.

"Come to the den at once; I wish to speak to you Helen--Ahem!" he said in his most severe tones.

"Yes, sir," responded the girl respectfully, and she pa.s.sed up the back stairway while Mr. Starkweather went directly to his library. Therefore he did not chance to meet either of his daughters and so was not warned of what had occurred in the house that afternoon.

"Helen," said Uncle Starkweather, viewing her with the same stern look when she approached his desk. "I must know how you have been using your time while outside of my house? Something has reached my ear which greatly--ahem!--displeases me."

"Why--I--I----" The girl was really at a loss what to say. She did not know what he was driving at and she doubted the advisability of telling Uncle Starkweather everything that she had done while here in the city as his guest.

"I was told this afternoon--not an hour ago--that you have been seen lurking about the most disreputable parts of the city. That you are a frequenter of low tenement houses; that you a.s.sociate with foreigners and the most disgusting of beggars----"

"I wish you would stop, Uncle," said Helen, quickly, her face flushing now and her eyes sparkling. "Sadie Goronsky is a nice girl, and her family is respectable. And poor old Mr. Lurcher is only unfortunate and half-blind.

He will not harm me."

"Beggars! Yiddish shoestring pedlars! A girl like you!

Where--ahem!--_where_ did you ever get such low tastes, girl?"

"Don't blame yourself, Uncle," said Helen, with some bitterness. "I certainly did not learn to be kind to poor people from _your_ example. And I am sure I have gained no harm from being with them once in a while--only good. To help them a little has helped me--I a.s.sure you!"

But Mr. Starkweather listened not at all to this. "Where did you find these low companions?" he demanded.

"I met Sadie the night I arrived here in the city. The taxicab driver carried me to Madison Street instead of Madison Avenue. Sadie was kind to me. As for old Mr. Lurcher, I saw him first in Mr. Grimes's office."

Uncle Starkweather suddenly lost his color and fell back in his chair. For a moment or two he seemed unable to speak at all. Then he stammered:

"In Fenwick Grimes's office?"

"Yes, sir."

"What--what was this--ahem!--this beggar doing there?"

"If he is a beggar, perhaps he was begging. At least, Mr. Grimes seemed very anxious to get rid of him, and gave him a dollar to go away."

"And you followed him?" gasped Mr. Starkweather.

"No. I went to see Sadie, and it seems Mr. Lurcher lives right in that neighborhood. I found he needed spectacles and was half-blind and I----"

"Tell me nothing more about it! Nothing more about it!" commanded her uncle, holding up a warning hand. "I will not--ahem!--listen. This has gone too far. I gave you shelter--an act of charity, girl! And you have abused my confidence by consorting with low company, and spending your time in a mean part of the town."

"You are wrong, sir. I have done nothing of the kind," said Helen, firmly, but growing angry herself, now. "My friends are decent people, and a poor part of the city does not necessarily mean a criminal part."

"Hush! How dare you contradict me?" demanded her uncle. "You shall go home. You shall go back to the West at once! Ahem! At once. I could not a.s.sume the responsibility of your presence here in my house any longer."

"Then I will find a position and support myself, Uncle Starkweather. I have told you I could do that before."

"No, indeed!" exclaimed Mr. Starkweather, at once. "I will not allow it.

You are not to be trusted in this city. I shall send you back to that place you came from--ahem!--Sunset Ranch, is it? That is the place for a girl like you."