row a little, and up would
come a-clucking all kinds of hens, little ones and big ones, and
young ones and old ones, and-- Don't you tell anybody, but I think
she'd come, too!" Dorothea's hands came together, and she laughed
gleefully. "Father says if Miss Robin would give up hoping she'd be
happier." Suddenly her face sobered. "Do all ladies try to marry a
man, Uncle Winthrop?"

"They most certainly do not." Laine smiled in Dorothea's face, and
before the child's clear eyes his own, full of weary pain, turned
away. "Many of them take very long to make up their minds to marry
at all."

"Have you ever asked one to marry you?"

Laine did not answer. Dorothea's question was unheard. His thoughts
were elsewhere.

"Have you?"

"Have I what?"

"Ever asked a lady to many you?"

"I have."

The hand which Dorothea had been stroking was dropped. She sprang to
her feet and stood in front of him, her hands clasped in rigid
excitement on her breast.

"When"--her voice curled upward in quivering delight--"when is she
going to do it, Uncle Winthrop?"

"I do not know. She has not said she would do it at all."

"Not said--she would--marry--you!" Delight had changed to
indignation high and shrill, and Dorothea's eyes blazed brilliantly.
"Is she a crazy lady?"

"She is not."

"Then why?"

"She is not quite sure she-- It is not a thing to talk about,
Dorothea." He drew her again on his lap and unclasped the clenched
fingers. "We are good friends, you and I, and I have told you what I
have told no one else. So far as I am concerned, it does not matter
who knows, but until she decides we will not talk of this again. You
understand, don't you, Dorothea?"

"I understand she must have very little sense. I don't see how you
could want to marry a lady who didn't know right off, the very first
minute, that she wanted to marry you. Do--do I know her, Uncle
Winthrop?"

"You do."

For a moment there was silence, broken only by the ticking of the
clock on the mantel; and slowly Dorothea turned to her uncle, her big
brown eyes troubled and uncertain. For half a moment she looked at
him, then, without warning, threw her arms around his neck and hid
her face against his.

"Is--is--it Claudia, Uncle Winthrop?" she whispered. "Is--it--my
cousin Claudia?"

"It is--your cousin Claudia."

The quiver in Laine's voice was beyond control, and, lifting the
child's face, he kissed it. "I have asked her to marry