"I need no introduction to the Greys. I have known you all so long through these great boys of mine that it feels like coming home, merely to meet you. It will take all of my two years' leave of absence to tell you how grateful I am for all that you have done for my boys. Dear Mrs. Grey, I am your humble debtor," said Commodore Rutherford, bending over the motherly hand which had wrought so much good to his sons, with a something caught in other climes added to his cordial frank heartiness of manner. "And which is Oswyth, my daughter Wythie?" he asked looking unerringly straight at Wythie's blushing and happy face. "My little girl, you dear, little old-fashioned, sweet faced little girl, I verily believe that Basil's love is not blind." And he kissed Wythie tenderly, half lifting her as he touched her cheeks. "Come to supper in my new little house, and insure its prosperity by its happy beginning," called Miss Charlotte's musical voice from the dining-room. CHAPTER FIFTEEN ITS FIRST WEDDING All winter Wythie had hemmed damask and stitched linen, like the old-fashioned little soul that she was. Not Oswyth Grey, the first, in her generation could have burned with more housewifely zeal for home-and-hand-made furnishings for the home to which she was never to go from the little grey house than did this Oswyth, set down, a sweet anachronism, amid the age of sewing-machines and ready-madeness. The long winter days were too short for the dear little woman, expert needlewoman though she was, in which to prepare for the home to which she was to go in June when Basil was graduated. The Caldwell place--now the Rutherford place--was going through thorough renovations. The Greys had always known that the Rutherford boys were provided with enough money to remove them beyond anxiety as to the future. It was precisely like their unworldliness to accept this fact vaguely, and it gave Wythie something approaching a shock to discover that Basil was rich, measured by her simple standards. "It won't matter in the least how poor are the books which he writes, Wythie; he will be able to live while they are writing, and then publish them himself and buy up the entire edition. So aren't you glad that his mother left Basil such a pretty little fortune?" asked Rob, energetically creasing the hem of the napkin for which she had offered her help. "I think Basil will write nothing but poetry for twelve months," added Prue. "So he will need every penny. I don't consider the Rutherford boys' fortune riches." "It is enough to keep up that big Caldwell place with two women and a man servant, and to live tastefully and other-fully; I call that rich, Prudence. What would you have?" said Rob.