ectionate?"

"Well, yes; and affectionate. I should certainly say that she is
affectionate."

"I'm sure she's clever."

"Yes, I think she's clever."

"And, and--and womanly in her feelings." Mrs. Gresham felt that she
could not quite say lady-like, though she would fain have done so had
she dared.

"Oh, certainly," said the doctor. "But, Mary, why are you dissecting
Miss Dunstable's character with so much ingenuity?"

"Well, uncle, I will tell you why; because--" and Mrs. Gresham, while
she was speaking, got up from her chair, and going round the table to
her uncle's side, put her arm round his neck till her face was close
to his, and then continued speaking as she stood behind him out of
his sight--"because--I think that Miss Dunstable is--is very fond of
you; and that it would make her happy if you would--ask her to be
your wife."

"Mary!" said the doctor, turning round with an endeavour to look his
niece in the face.

"I am quite in earnest, uncle--quite in earnest. From little things
that she has said, and little things that I have seen, I do believe
what I now tell you."

"And you want me to--"

"Dear uncle; my own one darling uncle, I want you only to do that
which will make you--make you happy. What is Miss Dunstable to me
compared to you?" And then she stooped down and kissed him. The
doctor was apparently too much astounded by the intimation given him
to make any further immediate reply. His niece, seeing this, left him
that she might go and dress; and when they met again in the
drawing-room Frank Gresham was with them.

CHAPTER XXIX

Miss Dunstable at Home

Miss Dunstable did not look like a love-lorn maiden, as she stood in
a small ante-chamber at the top of her drawing-room stairs, receiving
her guests. Her house was one of those abnormal mansions, which are
to be seen here and there in London, built in compliance rather with
the rules of rural architecture, than with those which usually govern
the erection of city streets and town terraces. It stood back from
its brethren, and alone, so that its owner could walk round it. It
was approached by a short carriage-way; the chief door was in the
back of the building; and the front of the house looked on to one
of the parks. Miss Dunstable in procuring it had had her usual
luck. It had been built by an eccentric millionaire at an enormous
cost; and the eccentric millionaire, after living in it for twelve
months, had declared that it did