brought Mary
Virginia and me back to each other. That's enough for _me_. I haven't
got any questions to ask." His voice faltered, and he gripped us by
the hand in turn, with a force that made me, for one, wince and
cringe. "And Padre--Bughunter, you both know that I--" he couldn't
finish.

"That we--" choked Mary Virginia.

"Sure we know," said the Butterfly Man hastily. "Don't you know you're
our kids and we've got to know?" He began to edge them towards the
door. I think his courage was getting a little raw about the corners.
"Yes, you two go on over to the Parish House parlor, where you'll have
a chance to talk without being interrupted--Madame will see to
that--and don't you show your noses outside of that room until
everything's settled the one and only way everything ought to be
settled." His eyes twinkled as he manoeuvered them outside, and then
stood in the doorway to watch them walk away--beautiful, youthful,
radiantly happy, and very close together, the girl's head just on the
level of the boy's shoulder. He was still faintly smiling when he came
back to us; if there was pain behind that smile, he concealed it. My
mother ran to him, impulsively.

"John Flint!" said she, profoundly moved and earnest. "John Flint, the
good God never gave me but one child, though I prayed for more. Often
and often have I envied her silly mother Mary Virginia. But now.
John, I know that if I could have had another child that, after
Armand, I'd love best and respect most and be proudest of in this
world, it would be _you_. Yes, _you_. John Flint, you are the best
man, and the bravest and truest and most unselfish, and the finest
gentleman, outside of my husband and my son, that I have ever known.
What makes it all the more wonderful is that you're a genius along
with it. I am proud of you, and glad of you, and I admire and love you
with all my heart. And I really wish you'd call me mother. You should
have been born a De Rance!"

This, from my mother! I was amazed. Why, she would think she was
flattering one of the seraphim if she had said to him, "You might have
been a De Rance!"

"Madame!" stammered Flint, "why, Madame!"

"Oh, well, never mind, then. Let it go at Madame, since it would
embarrass you to change. But I look upon you as my son, none the less.
I claim you from this hour," said she firmly, as one not to be
gainsaid.

"I'm beginning to believe in fairy-stories," said Flint. "The beggar
comes home--and he isn't