bably why you
didn't recognize him," said Hen, cheeringly. "They say the poor old
man's grieving himself to death."

Through Cally quivered an angry wonder why it was that only disagreeable
things happened nowadays. Why, why, when everything else was just as
abominable as possible, need that old man go prowling around the
streets, stopping on corners to stare at her?...

She went on quickly with a tinge of light bitterness in her voice:

"I'm sure it must be business, for there's a hard-times atmosphere
hanging over the house, all of a sudden, and mamma is constantly
remarking that there's a limit to my extravagance, etc., etc. She and I
happen to be on dreadfully formal terms just at present, which is
another of the joys of home. And to cap the climax," she added, with a
burst of confidence only half mocking, "I'm in an absolutely suitorless
condition--not a blessed swain to my name! I was never so destitute and
forlorn in my life!"

Hen, struck from the beginning with the unusual note in her brilliant
cousin's manner, laughed. She perceived that Cally wished to talk about
herself, and talk complainingly, and Hen didn't mind.

"First time I ever heard such a complaint in this quarter. Is J.
Forsythe Avery dead without my knowledge?"

"J. Forsythe is in New York. Robert's in the sulks. James Bogue, 2d, is
in bed--measles, if you please ... Do you ever have the horrible
nobody-loves-you feeling? Rather odious, isn't it?"

"Ghastly," said Hen.

"I'll be awfully glad to get away next month," continued Cally....

Interested by the hiatus in Cally's list of missing swains, Hen desired
that this conversation should go on. Like most people, the Cooneys had
of course heard of, and gossiped about, the open breach between their
cousin and Mr. Canning a month ago, promptly followed by the great young
man's departure from town. Through the masculine half of the local
world, it was generally assumed that Miss Heth had actually rejected
Mr. Canning. It was a rare tribute to the girl's attractions that not a
few women also believed this, even though Cally's best girl-friends,
like Mattie Allen, were perfectly _sure_ nothing of the sort had
happened....

Hen, a Cooney, had had a special reason for wondering if this
interesting affair might not be "on" again. However, Cally, skipping the
conversation along, was talking now of the visit she had in prospect to
her friend, Mrs. Willing, Florence Stone that was, in New York. Flo