ce. Fairfax bent and kissed her under the red hat on the hair.

"Now," she cried, nodding at him, "I've hunted you down, tracked you to
your lair, and you _can't_ escape. I want to see your work. Show me
everything."

But Fairfax put his hand up quickly, and before her eyes rested on the
bas-relief he had let the curtain fall.

"You're not an engineer any more, then, Cousin Antony?"

"No, Bella."

"Tell me why you ran away from us as you did? Oh!" she exclaimed,
clasping her pretty hands, "I've thought over and over the questions I
wanted to ask you, things I wanted to tell you, and now I forget them
all. Cousin Antony, it wasn't _kind_ to leave us as you did,--Gardiner
and me."

He watched her as she took a chair, half-leaning on its back before his
covered work. Bella's pose was graceful and elegant. Girl as she was,
she was a little woman of the world. She swung her gloves between her
fingers, looking up at him.

"It's nearly five years, Cousin Antony."

"I know it."

She laughed and blushed. "I've been running after you, _shockingly_,
haven't I? I ran away from home and found you in the queer little street
in the queer little home with those _angel_ Irish people! How are they
all, Cousin Antony, and the freckled children?"

"Bella," her cousin asked, "haven't they nearly finished with you in
school? You are grown up."

She shook her head vehemently. "Nonsense, I'm a dreadful hoyden still.
Think of it! I've never been on the roll of honour yet at St. Mary's."

"No?" he smiled. "They were wrong not to put you there. How is Aunt
Caroline?"

The girl's face clouded, and she said half under her breath--

"_Why, don't you know?_"

Ah, there was another grave, then? What did Bella mean?

She exclaimed, stopped swinging her gloves, folded her hands gravely--

"Why, Cousin Antony, didn't you read in the papers?"

He saw a rush of colour fill her cheeks. It wasn't death, then? He
hadn't seen any papers for some time, and he never should have expected
to find his aunt's name in the papers.

"I don't believe I can tell you, Cousin Antony."

He drew up a chair and sat down by her. "Yes, you can, little cousin."

Her face was troubled, but she smiled. "Yes, that was what you used to
call me, didn't you? You see, I'm hardly supposed to know. It's not a
thing a girl _should_ know, Cousin Antony. Can't you guess?"

"Hardly, Bella."

Fairfax wiped his hands on a bunch of cloths, and the dry morsels of
cl