Hephzy and I looked at each other and my "niece" looked at both of us. I could feel the blood tingling in my cheeks and forehead.

"Is it an American custom?" repeated Mr. Judson.

"I don't know," with chilling deliberation. "I am NOT an American."

The curate said "Indeed!" and had the astonishing good sense not to say any more. Shortly afterward he said good-by.

"But I shall look forward to our threesome, Miss Morley," he declared.

"I shall count upon it in the near future."

After his departure there was a most embarrassing interval of silence.

Hephzy spoke first.

"Don't you think you had better go in now, Frances," she said. "Seems to me you had. It's the first time you've been out at all, you know."

The young lady rose. "I am going," she said. "I am going, if you and--my uncle--will excuse me."

That evening, after dinner, Hephzy joined me in the drawing-room. It was a beautiful summer evening, but every shade was drawn and every shutter tightly closed. We had, on our second evening in the rectory, suggested leaving them open, but the housemaid had shown such shocked surprise and disapproval that we had not pressed the point. By this time we had learned that "privacy" was another sacred and inviolable English custom.

The rectory sat in its own ground, surrounded by high hedges; no one, without extraordinary pains, could spy upon its inmates, but, nevertheless, the privacy of those inmates must be guaranteed. So the shutters were closed and the shades drawn.

"Well?" said I to Hephzy.

"Well," said Hephzy, "it's better than I was afraid it was goin' to be.

I explained that you told the folks at Bancroft's she was your niece because 'twas the handiest thing to tell 'em, and you HAD to tell 'em somethin'. And down here in Mayberry the same way. She understood, I guess; at any rate she didn't make any great objection. I thought at the last that she was laughin', but I guess she wasn't. Only what she said sounded funny."

"What did she say?"

"Why, she wanted to know if she should call you 'Uncle Hosea.' She supposed it should be that--'Uncle Hosy' sounded a little irreverent."

I did not answer. "Uncle Hosea!" a beautiful title, truly.

"She acted so different to-day, didn't she," observed Hephzy. "It's because she's gettin' well, I suppose. She was real full of fun, wasn't she."

"Confound her--yes," I snarled. "All the fun is on her side. Well, she should make the best of it while it lasts. When she learns the truth she may not find it so amusing."

Hephzy sighed. "Yes," she said, slowly, "I'm afraid that's so, poor thing. When--when are you goin' to tell her?"

"I don't know," I answered. "But pretty soon, that's certain."

CHAPTER X

In Which I Break All Previous Resolutions and Make a New One

That afternoon tea on the lawn was the beginning of the great change in our life at the rectory. Prior to that Hephzy and I had, golfly speaking, been playing it as a twosome. Now it became a threesome, with other players added at frequent intervals. At luncheon next day our invalid, a real invalid no longer, joined us at table in the pleasant dining-room, the broad window of which opened upon the formal garden with the sundial in the center. She was in good spirits, and, as Hephzy confided to me afterward, was "gettin' a real nice appetite." In gaining this appetite she appeared to have lost some of her dignity and chilling condescension; at all events, she treated her American relatives as if she considered them human beings. She addressed most of her conversation to Hephzy, always speaking of and to her as "Miss Cahoon." She still addressed me as "Mr. Knowles," and I was duly thankful; I had feared being hailed as "Uncle Hosy."

After lunch Mr. Judson called again. He was passing, he explained, on his round of parish calls, and had dropped in casually. Mr. Worcester also came; his really was a casual stop, I think. He and his brother curate were very brotherly indeed, but I noticed an apparent reluctance on the part of each to leave before the other. They left together, but Mr. Judson again hinted at the promised golf game, and Mr. Worcester, having learned from Miss Morley that she played and sang, expressed great interest in music and begged permission to bring some "favorite songs," which he felt sure Miss Morley might like to run over.

Miss Morley herself was impartially gracious and affable to both the clerical gentlemen; she was looking forward to the golf, she said, and the songs she was certain would be jolly. Hephzy and I had very little to say, and no one seemed particularly anxious to hear that little.

The curates had scarcely disappeared down the driveway when Doctor Bayliss and his son strolled in from next door. Doctor Bayliss, Senior, was much pleased to find his patient up and about, and Herbert, the son, even more pleased to find her at all, I judge. Young Bayliss was evidently very favorably impressed with his new neighbor. He was a big, healthy, broad-shouldered fellow, a grown-up boy, whose laugh was a pleasure to hear, and who possessed the faculty, envied by me, the quahaug, of chatting entertainingly on all subjects from tennis and the new American dances to Lloyd-George and old-age pensions. Frances declared a strong aversion to the dances, principally because they were American, I suspected.

Doctor Bayliss, the old gentleman, then turned to me.

"What is the American opinion of the Liberal measures?" he asked.

"I should say," I answered, "that, so far as they are understood in America, opinion concerning them is divided, much as it is here."

"Really! But you haven't the Liberal and Conservative parties as we have, you know."

"We have liberals and conservatives, however, although our political parties are not so named."

"We call 'em Republicans and Democrats," explained Hephzy. "Hosy is a Republican," she added, proudly.

"I am not certain what I am," I observed. "I have voted a split ticket of late."

Young Bayliss asked a question.

"Are you a--what is it--Republican, Miss Morley?" he inquired.

Miss Morley's eyes dropped disdainfully.

"I am neither," she said. "My father was a Conservative, of course."

"Oh, I say! That's odd, isn't it. Your uncle here is--"

"Uncle Hosea, you mean?" sweetly. "Oh, Uncle Hosea is an American. I am English."

She did not add "Thank heaven," but she might as well. "Uncle Hosea"

shuddered at the name. Young Bayliss grinned behind his blonde mustache.

When he left, in company with his father, Hephzy invited him to "run in any time."

"We're next-door neighbors," she said, "so we mustn't be formal."

I was fairly certain that the invitation was superfluous. If I knew human nature at all I knew that Bayliss, Junior, did not intend to let formality stand in the way of frequent calls at the rectory.

My intuition was correct. The following afternoon he called again.

So did Mr. Judson. Both calls were casual, of course. So was Mr.

Worcester's that evening. He came to bring the "favorite songs" and was much surprised to find Miss Morley in the drawing-room. He said so.

Hephzy and I knew little of our relative's history. She had volunteered no particulars other than those given on the occasion of our first meeting, but we did know, because Mrs. Briggs had told us, that she had been a member of an opera troupe. This evening we heard her sing for the first time. She sang well; her voice was not a strong one, but it was clear and sweet and she knew how to use it. Worcester sang well also, and the little concert was very enjoyable.

It was the first of many. Almost every evening after dinner Frances sat down at the old-fashioned piano, with the candle brackets at each side of the music rack, and sang. Occasionally we were her only auditors, but more often one or both of the curates or Doctor and Mrs. Bayliss or Bayliss, Junior, dropped in. We made other acquaintances--Mrs. Griggson, the widow in "reduced circumstances," whose husband had been killed in the Boer war, and who occupied the little cottage next to the draper's shop; Mr. and Mrs. Samson, of Burgleston Bogs, friends of the Baylisses, and others. They were pleasant, kindly, unaffected people and we enjoyed their society.

Each day Frances gained in health and strength. The care-free, wholesome, out-of-door life at Mayberry seemed to suit her. She seemed to consider herself a member of the family now; at all events she did not speak of leaving nor hint at the prompt settlement of her preposterous "claim." Hephzy and I did not mention it, even to each other. Hephzy, I think, was quite satisfied with things as they were, and I, in spite of my threats and repeated declarations that the present state of affairs was ridiculous and could not last, put off telling "my niece" the truth. I, too, was growing more accustomed to the "threesome."