"Oh, no; you wouldn't, Bee. I don't think you know how to manage him. Now I can make him do anything I wish. I could show you a few little tricks—"
"Thank you," answered Bee with dignity. "I don't want any more of your tricks, Adele. One of them has caused quite enough mischief."
"But you have forgiven me that, Bee; haven't you? I saw that you had just as soon as you kissed me."
"Adele," spoke Bee earnestly, "I am trying to do it. It brought father back to me sooner than he would have come. For that reason I am going to be toward you as I used to be, but I don't want to talk about it too much. And I don't want any more of your tricks. That is, if you care to have me like you."
"Beatrice Raymond, what has come to you?" asked Adele, her eyes opening wide at her cousin's seriousness. "I never saw such a difference in any one as there is in you since your father's return. Of course you are going to be toward me just as you used to be. You always were fond of me, and you are going to love me just as much as ever. What in the world are you doing?"
Beatrice made no reply. They were in her room by this time, and Adele was taking down her hair to brush it. Bee was leaning far out of a window, looking toward the garden where the dim outline of the moss rose bush, the rose her mother had planted, could be seen. There were no roses now, but the bush stood shapely and symmetrical in the moonlight.
"He said that I looked like her," she mused thoughtfully, her heart going out with yearning toward that mother who was scarcely more than a memory to her. "And he loved her dearly, dearly!"