hed as Garda ended her speech. Mrs. Thorne often
coughed, and her coughs had a character of their own; they did not
appear to be pulmonary. They were delicate little sounds which came
forth apologetically, shielded by her hand, never quite completed; they
were not coughs so much as suggestions of coughs, and with these
suggestions she was in the habit of filling little pauses in the
conversation, covering up the awkwardnesses or mistakes of others (there
were never any of her own to cover), or acting as hyphen for disjointed
remarks when people had forgotten what they were going to say. It was,
indeed, a most accomplished cough, all Gracias had been indebted to it.
Lately, too, she had begun to use it to veil her own little periods of
consultation with herself regarding her daughter; for she seemed by no
means certain of the direction which this daughter's thoughts or words
might take, and the uncertainty troubled her careful maternal mind.
Garda, however, though often out of sight round some unexpected corner,
was never far distant; the hurrying elderly comprehension always caught
up with her before long; but these periods of uncertainty, combined with
cares more material, had ended by impressing upon Mrs. Thorne's face the
look of anxiety which was now its most constant expression--an anxiety
covered, however, as much as possible, by the mask of minutely careful
politeness which fitted closely over it, doing its best to conceal, or,
failing in that, to at least mark as private, the personal troubles
which lay underneath.

"Mamma's cough means that I am not sufficiently polite," said Garda; "I
always know what mamma's cough means." She rose, passed behind her
mother's chair, and bending forward over her small head, lightly kissed
her forehead. "I will go, mamma," she said, caressingly. "I will be
beautifully good, because to-morrow is your birthday; it ought to be a
dear little day, about six hours long, to fit you."

"I am fortunate to have asked my favor upon the eve of an anniversary,"
said Winthrop.

"You are," answered Garda, taking her broad-brimmed hat from the nail
behind her. "It's only upon such great occasions that I am really and
angelically good--as mamma would like me to be all the time."

"I will send Raquel after you, my daughter, with the umbrellas," said
Mrs. Thorne, with a little movement of her lips and throat, as though
she had just swallowed something of a pleasant taste, which was, with
her,