"I am Monica."
As she says this, she glances entreatingly from one old lady to the other, with some trouble in her great eyes, and some tears. Then all at once her lips tremble to a smile, and a soft light breaks upon her face.
"You are Aunt Priscilla," she says, turning to Miss Blake; "I know you by your dark eyes, and by your pretty hair!"
At the sound of her voice the two old ladies wake from their abstraction.
"Yes, yes, it is your aunt Priscilla," says Miss Penelope, eagerly, with a sudden pleased smile. Had the compliment been made to herself she could not possibly have appeared more delighted, and certainly would not have betrayed her satisfaction so openly. "Her hair," she says, "was always beautiful."
As for Miss Priscilla, she is smiling too, but in a shamefaced fashion, and is blushing a warm pretty crimson, such as a girl of seventeen might be guilty of, listening to a first word of love.
She takes Monica's right hand in hers and pats it softly; and Miss Penelope takes her left; and then the two old ladies stoop forward, and, one after the other, kiss the pale, girlish cheek, and with the kiss take her at once and forever into their very hearts.
"But surely, dear child, you did not come alone?" says Miss Priscilla, presently, calling to remembrance the fact that there ought to be two other Beresfords somewhere.
"No; Terence and Katherine are with me."
"But where, my dear?"