Sporetti? Has his ear grown out again? You know my uncle, I think?
Mr. Hutchinson Port."

Livingstone took the proffered hand with even more cordiality than it
was given, and then extended his own to Mr. Port--who seemed much less
inclined to shake it than to bite it.

"I think that we are justified in regarding ourselves as relations now,
Miss Lee, since our cousins have married each other, you know. Quite a
romance, wasn't it? And how very jolly it is to meet you here--when I
thought that you certainly were in Switzerland or Norway, or even over
in that new place that people are going to in Roumania! I flatter myself
that I always have rather a knack of falling on my feet, but, by Jove,
I'm doing it more than usual this morning!"

Miss Lee seemed to be entirely unaware of the fact that her uncle was
looking like an animated thunder-cloud. "It is just like a bit out of
a delightful novel," was her encouraging response. "A long, low, black
schooner suddenly coming in from the seaward and anchoring close off
shore, and the hero landing in a little boat just in time to slay the
villain and rescue the beautiful bride. Of course I'm the beautiful
bride, but my uncle is not a villain, but the very best of
guardians--by-the-way, I don't think that you know that poor dear mamma
is dead, Mr. Livingstone? Yes, she died only a week or two after you
left us. So you see you must be very nice to the villain--and you can
begin your kind treatment of him by having lunch with him and with me
too. Uncle Hutchinson was _so_ pleased when he saw you come ashore. He
said that we certainly must capture you, and he sent a man to bring some
hot soup for you at once--here it is now." And so it was, for Dorothy
herself very thoughtfully had given the order that she now modestly
attributed to her uncle.

And so in less than ten minutes from the moment when Mr. Port had
informed Dorothy that Van Rensselaer Livingstone was a very
objectionable person whom he desired to avoid, and whose introduction to
her was not even to be thought of, they all three were lunching together
in what to the casual observer seemed to be the most amicable manner
possible.

VIII.

"I've run over to look up Mrs. Rattleton," said Livingstone, as he
discussed with evident relish the _filet_ that Mr. Port charitably hoped
would choke him. "Very likely you haven't met her, for she's only just
got here. But you'll like her, I know, for she's ever so jolly. She's