I think."

Edith got out of the cab, feeling like a girl in a dream, and followed
her father up the gravel walk, noting mechanically the gorgeous
colouring of tulips and hyacinths that filled the flower-beds on either
hand.

A tall, grey-haired lady, well advanced in life, came slowly forward,
holding out a thin, cold hand, and saying in a frigid tone, "Well,
brother, so we meet again after these ten years. I hope you are well,
and have left your wife and family well also."

[Sidenote: A Doubtful Welcome]

"Quite well, thank you, Rachel, excepting Maria, who is never very well,
you know," said the doctor heartily, taking the half-proffered hand in
both his. "And how are you, after all this long time? You don't look a
day older than when we parted."

"I am sorry I cannot return the compliment," remarked the lady, with a
grim smile. "I suppose it is all the care and worry of your great family
of children that have aged you so. And Maria was always such a poor,
shiftless creature. I daresay, now, with all that your boys and girls
cost you, you have two or three servants to keep, instead of making the
girls work, and saving the wages and the endless waste that the best of
servants make."

"We have but two," said the doctor, in a slightly irritated tone of
voice. "My girls and their mother are ladies, Rachel, if they are poor.
I can't let them do the rough work. For the rest, they have their hands
pretty full, I can assure you. You have little idea, living here as you
do, how much there is to be done for a family of nine children."

"No, I am thankful to say I have not. But you had better come in, and
bring the girl with you."

With these ungracious words Aunt Rachel cast her eyes for the first time
upon Edith, who had stood a silent and uncomfortable listener while her
father and aunt were talking.

"Humph!" ejaculated Miss Harley, after looking her niece over from top
to toe with a piercing, scrutinising gaze, that seemed to take in every
detail of figure, face, and toilette, and to disapprove of all; "humph!
The child looks healthy, and that is all I can say for her. But bring
her in, Henry--Stimson and the boy can see to her box. I suppose you
will stay yourself for to-night?"

"I should not be able to go home to-night, as you know," replied Dr.
Harley. "But if my staying would be at all inconvenient, I can go to one
of the Silchester hotels."

His sister Rachel proved to be the same irritating, cross-grai