Milly, of course, was delighted. She was a quick, clever child, and had been rather too much for her sister. "It's so ripping staying on here," she informed Mrs. Burke. "I was so afraid I would be packed off to school. I pinch myself, sometimes, to make sure it is true. Do you think we shall tire you out if we stay on?" "I don't think so," said Mrs. Burke, with her old jolly laugh. "You'll keep me young, Milly. I've always hated a house full of middle-aged sober people who are past making jokes and playing the fool." Milly hugged her on the spot. "You are a delicious great-aunt. George says you might be only twenty, to hear you talk." And, of course, Mrs. Burke was human enough to be delighted with such a compliment. The day came when Rowena went down to Sussex to her sister-in-law's home. Geraldine welcomed her warmly, and her gentle old mother received her with old-fashioned sweetness and courtesy. The children were grown almost beyond recognition, but the little boys, Buttons and Bertie, remembered her, and flung themselves into her arms. "You are looking thin and worn," commented Geraldine. "Mother, we must feed her up, and treat her like an invalid. She must not go to her bridegroom a bag of bones." Rowena put her hands up to her cheeks, with her happy laugh. "Spare my blushes; I am not going to be married yet." "How long are you going to keep him waiting? Now come and sit down and let me talk to you for your good. You have a most unhappy trait of attaching yourself like a vice to any people you meet or places in which you may find yourself. Look at your year in that God-forsaken place, Abertarlie. Who but you would ever stick out a whole winter there?" Rowena's face grew very soft and grave. "Not 'God-forsaken,' Geraldine, for I found Him there!" "My dear, I know; it was the desolation of it drove you to seek consolation in religion. Now you have attached yourself to this old freak Mrs. Burke. I never approved of it from the first. If I had not known she was treating you well, I would have moved heaven and earth to get you away. You have forsaken us for her. You are even making Hugh Macdonald step aside and take the second place. He must be a saint to wait so patiently." "My dear Geraldine, we have only been engaged four or five months. He is not a young man, nor am I a very young woman. There is no occasion for us to rush into marriage so precipitously." "The fact that he is not a boy is in favour of a speedy marriage, I consider. You are both quite old enough to be certain of your own minds. He has been too long alone, and that nice child of his wants a woman to look after her." "She is very happy with her governess." "Don't go on making excuses for yourself, but tell me if you have fixed the day. The sooner you leave that old woman the better. You are simply a nurse-attendant to her. It isn't good enough. She has her sister now, and doesn't want you."