Vance was conscious of a slight feeling of somnolence. Really, he could not be expected to care for the Virginian cousin's voice. And Aunt Myrtle had such a soporific way of drawling out her sentences! He wished she would return to the subject of her luncheon-guest, and then, perhaps, he might manage to keep awake. "So you invited Miss Ainger to-day, to keep the young lady company?" he ventured to observe. "If you will give me time to explain, I will tell you that Katherine Ainger and she have struck up the greatest friendship this winter, and have been together part of every day. I wish, Vance, that you could bring yourself to extend some attention to your mother's first cousin's child. From Anita Clifton I expect nothing--absolutely nothing. Not belonging to the 'smart set,' whatever that may be, I make no demands upon Anita Clifton. But you, Vance, have not yet shown that you are absolutely heartless. When Eve goes home, as she soon will, it would be gratifying to have her able to say you had recognized her existence." "I will leave a card for the young lady in the hall," he said, awkwardly; "and perhaps she would allow me to order some flowers for her. Just now, Aunt Myrtle, I have an engagement, and I must really be going on." He had risen to his feet, and Mrs. Myrtle was about shaping a last arrow to aim at him, when the door opened, and a girl came into the room. "Oh! Cousin Augusta," she said, in the most outspoken manner, a slight Southern accent marking some of the syllables enunciated in a remarkably sweet voice, "I have been taking your Dandie Dinmont for a walk, and he has been such a good, obedient dear, you must give him two lumps of sugar when he comes to tea at five o'clock." As Mrs. Myrtle performed the ceremony of introduction between them, Vance became conscious that he was in the presence of one of the most radiantly pretty young persons who had ever crossed the line of his languid vision. Equipped in a tailor-made frock of gray serge, a black hat with many rampant plumes upon her red-brown hair, a boa of black ostrich feathers curling around her pearly throat and caressing the rosiest of cheeks, his Cousin Eve surveyed him with as much indifference as if he had been the veriest casual met in a crowd in Fifth Avenue. Two fingers of a tiny gloved hand were bestowed on him in recognition of their relationship, after which she resumed her interrupted talk about the dog. "You understand that Mr. Townsend is a relative, my dear?" asked Mrs. Myrtle, in her rocking-horse manner. "You have heard me speak of him?" "Yes; oh, yes, certainly," Eve said, with preoccupation. "But to us Virginians a cousin means either very much--or very, very little." "The presumption, then, is against me?" he asked, determined not to be subdued.