With a sweeping good-night to all the party, she went out before he could get up another roar. Mr. Andrews followed her, though she was half-way down the path before he overtook her. It was nearly August, and the days were already beginning to show the turn of the season. It was quite dark, coming from the lighted room. "I must beg you won't come any further with me," said Missy, at the gate. "It is quite light, and I am in the habit of walking all about the place at night." "You must allow me," said Mr. Andrews, not going back at all. "I think you are needed to keep the children in order, and I am sure you ought to go back and see about some dinner for those ladies, since you've brought them here," said Missy firmly, pulling the gate after her, and looking at Mr. Andrews from the other side of it. "I have no doubt they'll see about it themselves, they know more about it than I do. And I want to thank you, Miss Rothermel, for remembering Jay's birthday, for I am ashamed to say I had forgotten it myself. The poor boy would have had a dismal time if it had not been for you. I'm always having to thank you, you see." "I don't see why you should be at that pains. I didn't do it for--for anybody but Jay, and he and I can settle our little account between ourselves, as I told the new cousin just now. Good-night," and before Mr. Andrews could open the gate, she was swallowed up by the darkness and the shrubbery, and he was obliged to go home, which he did slowly and in some perplexity. He could only hope his cousins would not be as difficult to comprehend as his neighbor was. As for Missy, she came in with flushed cheeks and threw herself down on the seat beside her mother's sofa. "Aunt Harriet has not come down? That is the first thing that has gone right to-day. I've got so much to tell you. Mamma, they've come--the new cousins, I mean--right in the midst of the birthday party, and no dinner ready for them, and everything about as bad for me as it could be." "Now, I suppose you wish you had been contented to stay at home as I advised you. It _was_ unfortunate. Did Mr. Andrews come with them, and how did it happen that they were not expected?" "Oh, the telegram never was delivered, and they arrived in the last train, without any carriage to meet them, and trundled down four miles in the stage, and arrived hungry and tired, to find all the house dark but the dining-room, and a table full of bonbons and birthday fripperies, in place of the solid cheer that the solid host delights in. Jay met them with howls, and kicked the young lady till she could have cried; but Gabrielle made up in sweetness for the party, ingenuous child that she is!" "I suppose there is no use in asking if you like them: you had made up your mind on that point long before you saw them!"