"Hurrah!--Cally!" cried she. "We were talking of you at dinner to-day, wondering what had become of you. Come into the house, and don't mind a bit if this bottle leaks all over you. Such troubles!" "How is Chas to-day? I just heard that he hadn't been at work for a week." "Chas?... Chas is better--Cousin Martha's worse--father's just the same--Looloo's dancing the floor with a toothache." Hen recited this in the manner of a chant, and added, as she ushered her Washington Street cousin into the little parlor: "But for that, we're all doing nicely--thank you!" "Gracious, Hen! I'd no idea you had such a hospital. Why, what's the matter with Uncle John?" "Oh, just his lumbago. He's complaining, but out and about--fighting over the Seven Days around Richmond with an old comrade somewhere, I doubt not.... Sit down, my dear," added Hen, who had been looking at Cally just a little curiously, "and excuse me while I run upstairs. I forgot to explain that this bottle is for mother, who's down with a splitting headache. Back in a jiffy...." Thus Miss Cooney, not knowing that for one moment, at least, her society had been preferred above that of a Canning. Such was the odd little development. Carlisle, having been more with Henrietta in the past five weeks than she had commonly been in a year, had discovered her as undoubtedly a person you could talk things over with--the only person in the world, perhaps, that you could talk _this_ over with.... Possibly Hen, being a lynx-eyed Cooney, had somehow gathered that her lovely cousin had not dropped in merely to "inquire"; for when she returned to the parlor, having doubtless put her hot-water bottle where it would do the most good, she did not expend much time on reporting upon her invalids, or become involved in the minor doings of the day. Very soon she deflected, saying: "But you don't look particularly fit yourself, Cally. What's wrong with the world?" Cally, being still uncertain how far she cared to confide in Hen, met the direct question with a tentative lightness. "Oh!... Well, I _did_ just have a rather unpleasant experience, though I didn't know I showed it in my face!... We happened to look in at the Works for a few minutes--Mr. Canning and I--and I certainly didn't _enjoy_ it much ..." And then, the inner pressure overcoming her natural bent toward reserve, she spoke with a little burst: "Oh, Hen, it was the most horrible place I ever saw in my life!" The little confidence spoke straight to the heart, as a touch of genuine feeling always will. Quite unconsciously, Henrietta took her cousin's hand, saying, "You poor dear ..." And within a minute or two Cally was eagerly pouring out all that she had seen in the bunching-room, with at least a part of how it had made her feel.