Away from the usages of the city she had wisely insisted on keeping up the social forms which the Squire would at times have been glad to disregard.

For a moment Ann Penhallow lingered.

"We must try to make him feel at home, James." "Of course, my dear.

I can imagine how Susan Penhallow would have educated a boy, and now I know quite too well what we shall have to undo--and--do." "You won't, oh! you will not be too hard on him." "I--no, my dear--but--I suspect his American education has begun already." "What do you mean ?" "Ask Leila--and Billy.

But that can wait." They separated.
While his elders were thus briefly discussing this new addition to the responsibilities of their busy lives, the subject of their talk had been warmed into comfortable repossession of his self-esteem.