all live on this side of East River, and so I am rather more at home
here."

"Then you don't find New York lonesome," said Millard, with a falling
cadence, seeking to drop the conversation.

"Oh, no! I live near Stuyvesant Square, and I have an aunt in Washington
Square of whom I am very fond."

"I am often at the Gouverneurs, on the north side of the Square. I like
Washington Square very much," said Millard, getting on solid ground
again.

"We visit at the same house. Mrs. Gouverneur is my aunt," said Phillida.

Millard was a little stunned at this announcement. But his habitual tact
kept him from disclosing his surprise at finding Miss Callender's
affiliations better than he could have imagined. He only said with
unaffected pleasure in his voice:

"The Gouverneurs are the best of people and my best friends."

Mr. Hilbrough looked in amusement at his wife, who was manifestly
pleased to find that in Phillida she was entertaining an angel unawares.
Millard's passion for personal details came to his relief.

"Mrs. Gouverneur," he said, "had a brother and two sisters. You must be
the daughter of one of her sisters. One lives, or used to live, in San
Francisco, and the other married a missionary."

"I am the missionary's daughter," said Phillida.

Millard felt impelled to redeem his default by saying something to Miss
Callender about the antiquity and excellence of her mother's family. If
he had been less skillful than he was he might have given way to this
impulse; but with the knack of a conversational artist he contrived in
talking chiefly to Mrs. Hilbrough to lead the conversation to Miss
Callender's distinguished great-grandfather of the Revolutionary period,
who was supposed to shed an ever-brightening luster all the way down the
line of his family, and Millard added some traditional anecdotes of
other ancestors of her family on the mother's side who had played a
conspicuous part in the commercial or civic history of New York. All of
which was flattering to Miss Callender, the more that it seemed to be
uttered in the way of general conversation and with no particular
reference to her.

Hilbrough listened with much interest to this very creditable account of
Phillida's illustrious descent, and longed for the time when he should
have the fun of reminding his wife that he had held the opinion from the
beginning that Phillida Callender was good enough for anybody.

Mrs. Hilbrough took Phillida and left the