equence, your first cousin once removed. It
is--a--it is many years since she has been at Fernley; we must try to
make her comfortable during the time--the short time--she is with us.
You have put her in the Blue Room; that is comfortable, is it, and
properly fitted up,--all the modern inconveniences and abominations,
eh?"

Mr. Montfort's own room had a bare floor, a bed, a table, a chest of
drawers, and a pitcher and basin and bath that might have been made for
Cormoran or Blunderbore, whichever was the bigger.

"Everything, I think, uncle," faltered Margaret, turning crimson, and
beginning to tremble. "Oh! Oh, Uncle John! I have something to tell you.
I--I don't know how to tell you."

"Don't try, then, my dear," said Uncle John, in his own kind way.
"Perhaps it isn't necessary."

"Oh, yes, it is necessary. I shall have no peace till I do, uncle,--you
remember you asked me to take the White Rooms; you surely asked me,
didn't you?"

"Surely, my child," said Mr. Montfort, wondering much. "But I wished
you to do as you pleased, you know."

"Yes! Oh, uncle, that was it! When Cousin Sophronia came, she--she told
Elizabeth to have her trunks carried into the White Rooms."

"So!" said Mr. Montfort.

"Yes, uncle! I was in the passage, and heard her give the order, and
I--I could not bear it, Uncle John, I could not, indeed. I flew
up-stairs, and brought down some of my things,--all I could carry in two
trips,--and, when they came in with the trunk, I--I was sitting there,
and--and wondering why they came into my room. Uncle John, do you see?
Was it very, very wicked?"

For all reply, Mr. Montfort went off into a fit of laughter so prolonged
and violent, that Margaret, who at first tried to join in timidly,
became alarmed for him. "Ho! ho! ho!" he laughed, throwing his head
back, and expanding his broad chest. "Ha! ha! ha! so you--ho! ho!--you
got in first, little miss! Why wasn't I there to see? Oh, why wasn't I
there? I would give a farm, a good farm, to have seen Sophronia's face.
Tell me about it again, Margaret. Tell me slowly, so that I may see it
all. You have a knack of description, I know; show me the scene."

Slowly, half frightened, and wholly relieved, Margaret went through the
matter from beginning to end, making as light as she could of her own
triumph, of which she really felt ashamed, pleased as she was to have
achieved it. When she had finished, her uncle sat down under a tree, and
laughed again;