He felt thankful that his cousin was leaving that huge town house which lawyers and auctioneers, and bankruptcy messengers, were soon to fill with their pervading presence. "May I come and see you, Mrs. Mortomley?" he asked, as he bade her good-bye at the Great Eastern terminus. "Certainly," she answered. "Our cottage is a small one, but, as the Americans say, it opens into all out of doors." He retained her hand for a moment, looked earnestly in her face as she said this, then the train was off, and, she smiling at him, bowed and kissed her finger in acknowledgment of his uplifted hat. They were gone, and he walked slowly out of the station full of a fancy her words had conjured up. CHAPTER XIII. SAD CONFIDENCES. Winter was gone, spring had come, and if the song of the turtle dove was not heard in the land, the wood-pigeons made noise enough about the Mortomleys' house to almost deafen its occupants. Spring had come, spring in its garments of vivid green, decked and studded with primrose stars; spring, bringing the perfume of up-springing sap, of tender violets, of early hyacinths to refresh the sense; spring with its promise of daisies and buttercups, of fragrant hawthorn, of budding wild roses. With everything beautiful decking the earth in honour of her advent, spring came smiling that year across the fair English landscape. Sunshine and blue sky everywhere overhead; underfoot springing grass and luxuriant wheat and flowers, and bud and leaf; and at the first, and when the first spring bird's twitter announced that the loveliest season of all the English year was close at hand, Dolly's spirits rose like the heart of a giant refreshed to give the sweet visitor greeting. She had been ailing and languid all through the tedious winter, but at sight of the sunshine, at sound of the songs of birds, somewhat of her former brightness returned. "I know now," she said, "how glad that poor dove must have been to get out of the ark. I never used to be tired of winter, but latterly the winters have seemed so long and cold and dreary." "And yet we have kept up glorious fires this winter," remarked Mortomley, to whom health and comparative youth seemed to have been restored as by a miracle. "Yes," agreed his wife, "what should we have done without the great logs of woodand you--aunt?" and she held out a grateful hand to Miss Gerace, who never intended to go back to Dassell any more, who had given up her house, her maid, her furniture to 'the ladies,' as they were styled in that far-away region, Mesdames Trebasson and Werner; who never intended to leave Dolly again, and who had with tears in her eyes entreated her niece's forgiveness because she had, thinking Mrs. Mortomley could never come to want, sunk the principal of her money in an annuity.