Genevieve looked up into the vivacious face of the younger girl with an affectionate smile on her delicately curved lips and tears of joy in her hazel eyes.
"It is good to be home again, dear!" she murmured. She drew Dolores about to face the big man, who stood looking on with rather a surly expression, in his pale blue eyes. "Tom," she said, "this is my cousin, Miss Gantry. Dolores, Mr. Blake."
"The hee-row!" sighed Dolores, clasping a hand dramatically on her heart.
Blake's strong face lighted with a humorous smile. "Guess I've got to own up to it, Miss Dolores. Anything Jenny—Miss Leslie—says goes."
As he spoke he raised his English steamer cap slightly and extended a square powerful hand. Dolores entrusted her slender fingers to the calloused palm, which closed upon them with utmost gentleness.
"Really, Mr. Blake!" she exclaimed, "I mean it. You are a hero."
Blake's smile broadened, and as he released her hand, he glanced at her mother, who had drawn a little apart with the Englishman. "Don't let me shut out your mamma and Jimmy."
"Oh, mamma believes that any display of family affection is immodest," she replied. "But duty, you know—duty!"
She whirled about and impressed a loud salute upon the drooping jowl of the stately Mrs. Gantry.
"Dolores!" admonished the dame. "When will you remember you're no longer a hoyden? Such impetuosity—and before his lordship!"