it would ennoble your character.
Not that it needs it," she added hastily. "And I could write another
story about that quaint old man who paid the musicians to go away, and
who made us all laugh so much."

Cynthia's eye kindled.

"Mr. Bass isn't a quaint old man," she said; "he's the greatest man in
the state."

Miss Duncan's patronage had been of an unconscious kind. She knew that
she had offended, but did not quite realize how.

"I'm so sorry," she cried, "I didn't mean to hurt you. You live with him,
don't you--Coniston?"

"Yes," replied Cynthia, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

"I've heard about Coniston. It must be quite a romance in itself to live
all the year round in such a beautiful place and to make your own
clothes. Yours become you very well," said Miss Duncan, "although I don't
know why. They're not at all in style, and yet they give you quite an air
of distinction. I wish I could live in Coniston for a year, anyway, and
write a book about you. My brother and Bob Worthington went out there one
night and serenaded you, didn't they?"

"Yes," said Cynthia, that peculiar flash coming into her eyes again, "and
I think it was very foolish of them."

"Do you?" exclaimed Miss Duncan, in surprise; "I wish somebody would
serenade me. I think it was the most romantic thing Bob ever did. He's
wild about you, and so is Somers they have both told me so in
confidence."

Cynthia's face was naturally burning now.

"If it were true," she said, "they wouldn't have told you about it."

"I suppose that's so," said Miss Duncan, thoughtfully, "only you're very
clever to have seen it. Now that I know you, I think you a more
remarkable person than ever. You don't seem at all like a country girl,
and you don't talk like one."

Cynthia laughed outright. She could not help liking Janet Duncan, mere
flesh and blood not being proof against such compliments.

"I suppose it's because my father was an educated man," she said; "he
taught me to read and speak when I was young."

"Why, you are just like a person out of a novel! Who was your father?"

"He kept the store at Coniston," answered Cynthia, smiling a little
sadly. She would have liked to have added that William Wetherell would
have been a great man if he had had health, but she found it difficult to
give out confidences, especially when they were in the nature of
surmises.

"Well," said Janet, stoutly, "I think that is more like a story than
ever. Do you kn