"I'm Annabel Armstrong," she said, settling the question. Helen gave her a second look and saw that Miss Annabel carried signs of maturity in her face and form, albeit she carried them very blithely indeed. "And I can't tell you how glad I am you've come. You'll just adore Algonquin. It's the gayest place on earth, a dance or a tea or a bridge or some sort of kettle-drum every day. What a love of a dress! It's the very colour of your eyes, my dear. Come away now; you must meet Mother. She always takes supper in her own room now, and I must carry it to her. Our little maid is about as much use as a pussy-cat and if I'm not in the kitchen every ten minutes to tramp on her tail she'll go to sleep. Come along!" She danced away down the hall, Helen following her, feeling extremely old and prim. Grandma Armstrong's bedroom was at the back of the house overlooking the orchard and kitchen-garden. She was sitting up in bed, a very handsome little old lady in cap and ribbons. She gave the strange girl's hand a gentle pressure. "Here she is, Muzzy," cried Miss Annabel in an apologetic tone. "It's too bad you didn't see her sooner, but she was so busy." "Indeed I generally notice that I am left to the last, when any new person comes to the house," said Grandma Armstrong in a grieved tone. "Well, my dear, I am pleased to see the Rev. Walter Murray's son in my house. You look like him--yes, very much, just the image of him in fact, only of course he was a man and wore a portmanteau when I knew him." Grandma Armstrong's separate faculties were all alert and as keen as they had ever been in youth. But some strange lack of connection between her tongue and her memory, seemed to have befallen the old lady, so that they did not always agree, and she was wont to intersperse her otherwise quite intelligent conversation with words having no remotest connection with the context. "A moustache, you mean, Muzzy dear," said her daughter. "Mother forgets you know," she added, in a hasty, low apology to Helen. "Why do you interrupt me, Annabel? I said a moustache. I hope you sleep well here, my dear. I had that room of yours for some time, but I had to move back here, I could never get to sleep after they put up the Israelite at the corner. It shone right over my bed. Let me see now. You are the second daughter, are you not? Your father was a fine man, my dear. Yes, indeed. We knew him well as a student. He preached one summer in--where was that, Annabel? Alaska?" "Muskoka, Mother." "Oh, yes, Muskoka, and the Rev. Walter Hislop, your father, was there as a student." "Murray, you mean, Mother." "Don't interrupt me, Annabel. Your uncle preached there two summers, my dear, and I thought my daughter Annabel and he--" "It was Elizabeth, Mother, not me! Good gracious, how old do you think I am?" demanded Miss Annabel, quite alarmed.