“I think we shall, indeed,” he said, warmly,--“nay, we are. It would be a strange fellow indeed who would not be glad to be brother, or anything else, to a girl like you.” “Brother, _not_ anything else,” said Sophy, audibly but softly. “Ah, Bertie! you can’t think how glad I am. As soon as we saw you, Kate and I could not help feeling what an advantage Reine had over us. To have you to refer to always--to have you to talk to--instead of the nonsense that we girls are always chattering to each other.” “Well,” said Herbert, more and more pleased, “I suppose it is an advantage; not that I feel myself particularly wise, I am sure. There is always something occurring which shows one how little one knows.” “If _you_ feel that, imagine how _we_ must feel,” said Sophy, “who have never had any education. Oh yes, we have had just the same as other girls! but not like men--not like you, Bertie. Oh, you need not be modest. I know you haven’t been at the University to waste your time and get into debt, like so many we know. But you have done a great deal better. You have read and you have thought, and Reine has had all the advantage. I almost hate Reine for being so much better off than we are.” “But, really,” cried Herbert, laughing half with pleasure, half with a sense of the incongruity of the praise, “you give me a great deal more credit than I deserve. I have never been very much of a student. I don’t know that I have done much for Reine--except what one can do in the way of conversation, you know,” he added, after a pause, feeling that after all it must have been this improving conversation which had made his sister what she was. It had not occurred to him before, but the moment it was suggested--yes, of course, that was what it must be. “Just what I said,” cried Sophy; “and we never had that advantage. So if you find us frivolous, Bertie--” “How could I find you frivolous? You are nothing of the sort. I shall almost think you want me to pay you compliments--to say what I think of you.” “I hate compliments,” cried Sophy. “Here we are on the lawn, Bertie, and here are the others. What do you think of it? We have had such trouble with the grass--now, I think, it is rather nice. It has been rolled and watered and mown, and rolled and watered and mown again, almost every day.” “It is the best croquet-ground in the county,” said the Major; “and why shouldn’t we have a game? It is pleasant to be out of doors such a lovely day.” This was assented to, and the others went in-doors for their hats; but Sophy stayed. “I have got rid of any complexion I ever had,” she said. “I am always out of doors. The sun must have got tired of burning me, I am so brown already,” and she put up two white, pink-fingered hands to her white-and-pink cheeks. She was one of those blondes of satin-skin who are not easily affected by the elements. Herbert laughed, and with the privilege of cousinship took hold of one of the pink tips of the fingers, and looked at the hand.