"Then are you my cousin, too?" he asked, suddenly struck by an idea that sent a gleam of pleasure to his eye.
"Oh, no," said Nora, demurely. "I'm no relation. It is only Janetta—her mother was Mr. Brand's father's cousin. But that was not my mother—Janetta and I are stepsisters."
"Surely that makes a relationship, however," said Cuthbert, courageously. "If your stepsister is my second cousin, you must be a sort of step-second-cousin to me. Will you not condescend to acknowledge the connection?"
"Isn't the condescension all on your side?" said Nora coolly. "It may be a connection, but it certainly isn't a relationship."
"I am only too glad to hear you call it a connection," said Cuthbert, with gravity. And then the two laughed—Nora rather against her will—Cuthbert out of amusement at the situation, and both out of sheer light-heartedness. And when they had laughed the ice seemed to be broken, and they felt as if they were old friends.
"I did not know that any of our relations were living in Beaminster," he resumed, after a moment's pause.
"I suppose you never even heard our name," said Nora, saucily.
"I don't—know——" he began, in some confusion.
"Of course you don't. Your father had a cousin and she married a doctor—a poor country surgeon, and so of course you forgot all about her existence. She was not my mother, so I can speak out, you know. Your father never spoke to her again after she married my father."
"More shame to him! I remember now. Your father is James Colwyn."