This notion amused the girls immensely, then and afterwards. They began to talk of the future Lady Challoner. Nan proposed one of the Paines. Phillis thought if Grace Drummond were only as sweet-looking as her photograph he could hardly help falling in love with her. And Dulce was of opinion that Adelaide Sartoris, handsome and queenly as she was, would not consider a baronet beneath her. They confided all these thoughts to Sir Harry, who thanked them quite gravely for their interest and promised to consider the matter. He even wrote down the names in his pocket-book one after another. "Adelaide Sartoris, did you say? Ah, we had an Adelaide at Sydney, a little, dark thing, with hair blown all over her temples, and such a pair of mischievous eyes: that girl was always laughing at me, somehow. And yet she seemed sorry to bid me good-bye." "Perhaps she was in love with you?" observed Dulce. But Phillis frowned at this. She thought they had gone too far in their jokes already with a cousin who was such a complete stranger. But he returned, quite gravely,-- "Well, now, you know, such a thing never came into my head. I talked to her because a fellow likes to be amused by a lively girl like Miss Addie. But as to thinking seriously of her--well, I could not stand that, you know to be laughed at all one's life; eh, Miss Mattie?" And Mattie, at this appeal, looked up with round, innocent eyes, and said, "Certainly not," in such an impressive tone that the other girls burst out laughing. They all went home after that. Sir Harry escorted his cousins and Mattie to the Friary, and then returned to his hotel to dinner. But the girls, who were in a merry mood, would not part with Mattie. They sent her home to put on her green silk dress, with strict orders that she was to return as soon as possible. "We are all going to make ourselves pretty," announced Phillis. "A cousin does not turn up every day; and when he promises to be a good fellow, like Harry, we cannot do him too much honor." "Ah, I should like to come," returned Mattie. "I have had such a nice day; and, if Archie will not mind----" And then she bustled into the vicarage, and into her brother's study. Archie roused himself a little wearily from his abstraction to listen to his sister's story; but at the end of it he said good-naturedly, for he had taught himself to be tolerant of Mattie's little gaucheries,--