a pleasant journey," she was beginning formally, when
Mrs. Caldwell suddenly burst into tears. "What is the matter,
Caroline?" Aunt Victoria asked.

"Oh, nothing," the poor lady answered in a broken voice. "Only it does
seem a sad home-returning--alone--without _him_--you know."

Aunt Grace Mary furtively patted Mrs. Caldwell on the back, keeping an
eye on Aunt Victoria the while, however, as if she were afraid of
being caught.

All this time the tinkle-tinkle-tinkle of "Hamilton's Exercises for
Beginners" on the piano had been going on; now it stopped. Aunt Grace
Mary slipped into a chair, and sat with a smile on her face; Aunt
Victoria became a trifle more rigid over her tatting; and Mrs.
Caldwell hurriedly wiped her eyes. Then the door opened deliberately,
and there entered a great stout man, with red hair sprinkled with
grey, large prominent light-coloured eyes, a nondescript nose, a wide
shapeless gash of a mouth, and a red moustache with straight bristly
hairs, like the bristles of a broom.

"How do you do, Caroline?" he said, holding out his big, fat, white
hand, and kissing her coldly on the forehead. He drawled his words out
with a decided lisp, and in a very soft voice, which contrasted oddly
with his huge bulk. Having greeted his sister, he turned and looked at
the children. Mildred went up and shook hands with him.

"Your sisters, I perceive, have no manners," he observed.

Beth had been beaming round blandly on the group; but upon that last
remark of Uncle James's the pleased smile faded from her face, and she
coloured painfully, and offered him a small reluctant hand.

"You are Elizabeth, I suppose?" he said.

"I am Beth," she answered emphatically.

She and Uncle James looked into each other's eyes for an instant, and
in that instant she made a most disagreeable impression of
fearlessness on the big man's brain.

"I hope, Caroline," he said precisely, "that you will not continue to
call your daughter by such an absurd abbreviation. That sort of thing
was all very well in the wilds of Ireland, but here we must have
something rational, ladylike, and recognised."

Mrs. Caldwell looked distressed. "It would be so difficult to call her
Elizabeth," she pleaded. "She is not at all--Elizabeth."

"You may call me what you like, mamma," Beth put in with decision;
"but I shall only answer to Beth. That was the name my father gave me,
and I shall stick to it."

Uncle James stared at her in amazement,