ladylike wife, the right sort of sound stuff that old England's heart
is made of. It was worth anything to have seen it! They do
incalculable good with their work-people. I saw the whole concern.'

He launched into an explanation of the process, producing from his
pocket, papers of the ore, in every stage of manufacture, and twisting
them up so carelessly, that they would have become a mass of confusion,
had not Mary undertaken the repacking.

As they approached the house, the library window was thrown up, and
Mrs. Frost came hurrying down with outstretched arms. She was met by
her young nephew with an overflow of fond affection, before he looked
up and beheld his father standing upright and motionless on the highest
step. His excuses were made more lightly and easily than seemed to
suit such rigid looks; but Lord Ormersfield bent his head as if
resigning himself perforce to the explanation, and, with the softened
voice in which he always spoke to Mrs. Ponsonby, said, 'Here he
is--Louis, you remember your cousin.'

She was positively startled; for it was as if his mother's deep blue
eyes were raised to hers, and there were the same regular delicate
features, fair, transparent complexion, and glossy light-brown hair
tinted with gold--the same careless yet deprecating glance, the same
engaging smile that warmed her heart to him at once, in spite of an air
which was not that of wisdom.

'How little altered you are!' she exclaimed. 'If you were not taller
than your father, I should say you were the same Louis that I left
fourteen years ago.'

'I fear that is the chief change,' said Lord Ormersfield.

'A boy that would be a boy all his life, like Sir Thomas More's son!'
said Louis, coolly and simply, but with a twinkle in the corner of his
eye, as if he said it on purpose to be provoking; and Mrs. Frost
interposed by asking where the cousins had met, and whether they had
known each other.

'I knew him by what you said yesterday,' said Mary.

'Louis le Debonnaire? asked Mrs. Frost, smiling.

'No, Mary; not that name!' he exclaimed. 'It is what Jem calls me,
when he has nothing more cutting to say--'

'Aye, because it is exactly what you look when you know you deserve a
scolding--with your shoulders pulled down, and your face made up!' said
his aunt, patting him.

When Mrs. Ponsonby and Mary had left the room to dress, Louis
exclaimed, 'And that is Mrs. Ponsonby! How ill she does look! Her
very voice ha