At last a peculiar series of rings brought her dancing downstairs
At the foot of the stairs Jacquette came suddenly on the three Maries, trying to conceal a bulky hatbox, as they caught sight of her.
“What’s that, girls? Shan’t I take it?” she inquired, with gleeful innocence.
“No, thank you!” Marie Stanwood answered, emphatically, thrusting the box behind her. “Where’s your Aunt Sula?”
“Oh! A thousand pardons!” Jacquette apologised, with a mischievous laugh. “Tia, you’re needed here.”
Then on she went in search of Quis, beckoning him, as soon as she caught his eye, to follow her into the empty dining-room.
“Quis,” she began, breathlessly, as soon as they were alone together, “there’s one thing I’m nervous about, to-night, because I don’t know how you’ll take it. Please promise that you’ll be all right before I tell you. Please!”
“How could I help it, fairy princess?” he answered, smiling, and, as he spoke, his thoughts and hers flew back to the night when he had met his Brookdale cousin at the train, more than three years before. “I’ll promise anything you say.”
“Oh, thank you! It’s—well, you know little Mary Elliott—the girl I like so much? She and her father moved here last fall, and only lately I’ve found out the most surprising thing! Clarence Mullen is some sort of a cousin of hers.”
“Well?”