"Your kinswoman!" the girl echoed, amazedly, and he explained, laughingly:
"You are my cousin's daughter for one thing, and for the other you are my sister-in-law."
"What can you mean?"
"I married Maud Van Zandt two weeks ago," he replied.
The warm color came rushing into Una's pale cheeks.
"Oh!" she cried, "how happy you make me. And dear Maud—is she here?"
"She is at my home, the Magnolias. Have you any one else to ask about, belle cousine?" chaffingly.
"E—dith?" falteringly, and blushing up to her eyes.
"Edith is at the Magnolias, too. Ah, I see your eyes asking me about some one else. No wonder you are ashamed to speak his name after the shameful way you have treated him. Well, I will be generous, Mrs. Van Zandt. Eliot—ah! now I see how you can blush—is also at my home, and presently I am going to take another guest to the Magnolias—even yourself."
"Not—not until you tell me all!" the girl faltered, trembling with such happiness that she could scarcely speak.