"My little niece, Queenie!" he exclaimed, taking the two little hands warmly into his own.
"This is my Uncle Robert Lyle," she said, presenting him to her husband. "You see, Lawrence, he does not disown me!"
The old gentleman looked down fondly into her sweet face.
"Oh! how could they disown you?" he exclaimed. "You have changed but little since I saw you last, and that change has only made you more lovely. I should have known you anywhere, though it is five years since I saw you last. I have heard your sad story, my dear, and I do not doubt its truth for an instant. I would have hastened to you at once, but I was ill and unable to travel."
She flashed a look of silent gratitude upon him from her dusky eyes.
"And by the way," he said, "I owe you a scolding, little Queenie, for your failure to come abroad with your mother and sisters four years ago. It was a great disappointment to me when they came without you. I did not enjoy the year we traveled together half so well as I should if my little pet had been with us."
Queenie stood silent, growing white and red by turn. Captain Ernscliffe stared from one to the other in blank astonishment.
"Surely, Mr. Lyle, I have misunderstood your meaning," he said, "Queenie certainly went to Europe that year with her mother and sisters!"