"No?" said Mr. Desmond regretfully. "Well, then, a pity it is too, for never a one of my Aunt Elizabeth's descendants have I met with yet, and I 'm beginning to be afraid that she was so lost to all sense of the family traditions as to die without leaving any."
"If she so far forgot," Aline began a little haughtily, and then, remembering, blushed a very vivid crimson, and was silent.
"Well, well, I 'm afraid she did," sighed Mr. Desmond; "and now I come to think of it you 'll be Conor Desmond's granddaughter, he that was proscribed, and racketed all over Europe. His daughter married a M. de—Roche—Roche——"
"Rochambeau, Monsieur. Yes, I was Aline de Rochambeau."
"Was?" said Mr. Desmond curiously, and then fell to whistling.
"Oh, my faith, yes, I remember,—Marguerite told me," and there was a slight embarrassed pause which Desmond broke into with a laugh.
"After all, now, that kiss was not so out of place," he said, with a twinkle in his green eyes. "Cousins may kiss all the world over."
His glance was too frank to warrant offence, and Aline answered it with a smile.
"With Monsieur's permission I shall wait until I can kiss Madame ma cousine," she said, and dropped him a little curtsey.
Mr. Desmond sighed.