He sat down heavily in a porch chair. "Go and get Mary," he exploded; "bring her here. The thing is done. The milk is spilled. And there's no use crying over it. And if you think you two young people can separate me and Bob Flippin----" Mrs. Beaufort and Becky came down presently, to find the old man gazing, frowning, into space. "I have told him to bring Mary, Claudia, but I must say that I am bitterly disappointed." "Mary is a good little thing, Father." Aunt Claudia's voice shook. The old man looked up at her. "It is hardest for you, my dear. And I have helped to make it hard." He reached out his hand to her. She took it. "He is my son--and I love him----" "And I love you, Claudia." "May I get the blue room ready?" The blue room was the bridal chamber at Huntersfield; kept rather sacredly at other times for formal purposes. "Do as you please. The house is yours, my dear." And so that night the lights of the blue room shone on Fiddle Flippin and her new grandmother. "Do you think she would let me put her to bed?" Mrs. Beaufort had asked Mary. "If you will sing, 'Jack-Sam Bye.'" Mary pulled the last little garment from the pink plump body, and Fiddle, like a rosy Cupid, counted her toes gleefully in the middle of the wide bed. "I told Truxton," Mary said suddenly, "that he might not want to call her 'Fiddle.' The whole neighborhood says 'Fiddle Flippin.'" "It is a dear little name," Aunt Claudia was bending adoringly over the baby, "but Fidelity is better--Fidelity Branch Beaufort----" "I want her to be as proud of her name as I am," Mary's voice had a thrilling note. "It is a great thing to know that my child has in her the blood of all those wonderful people whose portraits hang in the hall. I want her to be worthy of her name." She could have said nothing better. Aunt Claudia's face was lighted by the warmth in her heart. "Such a lot of ancestors for one little fat Fidelity," she said; "put on her nightgown, Mary, and I'll rock her to sleep." CHAPTER X A GENTLEMAN'S LIE I Becky was not well. Aunt Claudia, perceiving her listlessness, decided that she needed a change. Letters were written to the Nantucket grandfather, and plans made for Becky's departure. She was to spend a month on the island, come back to Boston to the Admiral's big old house on the water-side of Beacon Street, and return to Huntersfield for Christmas. Becky felt that it was good of everybody to take so much trouble. She really didn't care in the least. She occupied herself steadily with each day's routine. She bent her head over the fine embroidery of a robe she was making for Mary. She cut the flowers for the vases and bowls, she recited nursery rhymes to Fiddle, entrancing that captious young person with "Oranges and Lemons" and "Lavender's Blue." She read aloud to the Judge, planned menus for Aunt Claudia, and was in fact such an angel in the house that Truxton, after three days of it, protested.