wo minutes more Hyacinthe King had been welcomed kindly
by one aunt and tenderly pressed to the heart of the other. A sober
housemaid had taken her wraps, and was even now unpacking her boxes in
the chamber above. She was sitting in Miss Juliet's own armchair, and
had greatly surprised Ponto, the ancient cat, by taking him into her
lap.

"Will you ring for tea and candles, sister?" asked Miss King
primly.--"We have had tea of course, Hyacinthe, but we will have some
infused for you at once."

"Perhaps Hyacinthe doesn't like tea," suggested Miss Juliet with her
thin, once-pretty hand on the rope.

"Not like tea? Absurd! Was not her father an Englishman, I should like
to know? Our niece is not a heathen, Juliet."

"But, aunt," smiled Hyacinthe, "I do not like tea, after all. You are
both so kind to me," sighed she: "I hope you will not ever regret my
coming to England and to you."

"It is not likely that our niece--"

"That Ernest's daughter--" said Miss Juliet softly.

"Should ever do aught to give us cause to blush--"

"Save with pride and pleasure," added the younger old lady, laying her
fingers on the girl's soft, dark, abundant hair.

"I hope not, aunts." Hyacinthe looked at Miss King a bit wistfully as
she spoke. "You know I am not come to be a burden to you--the madre
wrote: I am come to England to pursue my art."

"My sister-in-law did--"

"Your dear mother did--" Miss Juliet chimed in gently.

"Write something of the kind, but, Hyacinthe, ladies do not go out
into the world seeking their fortunes. I believe I have heard"--Miss
King speaks austerely and as from some pinnacle of pride--"that
there are _women_ who write and lecture and paint, and, in short,
do anything that is disgraceful; but you, my dear, are not of that
blood."

"Yes, aunt, I am. I would do any of those things--must do one of them
or something--to help me find my Saxon god."

"Your what?" cries Miss King, staring over her spectacles at the
serene, heroic young face.

"Your what, dear child?" murmurs Miss Juliet protectively, looking
down into her niece's dark, fathomless eyes.

"Saxon god," says she quite low, for the first time in all her life
experiencing a conscious shyness.

"Are you a pagan, Hyacinthe King?" shrieks the elder aunt.

"Tell us all about it, my dear," says Miss Juliet soothingly.

And Hyacinthe tells them her dream and her resolve.

"So much for an honest English gentleman wedding with a--"

"Lovely