The three had been playmates once, and Andre-Louis--in view of his spiritual relationship with her uncle--she called her cousin.

The cousinly relations had persisted between these two long after Philippe de Vilmorin had outgrown the earlier intimacy, and had become to her Monsieur de Vilmorin.
She waved her hand to them in greeting as they advanced, and stood--an entrancing picture, and fully conscious of it--to await them at the end of the terrace nearest the short avenue by which they approached.
"If you come to see monsieur my uncle, you come inopportunely, messieurs," she told them, a certain feverishness in her air.

"He is closely--oh, so very closely--engaged." "We will wait, mademoiselle," said M.de Vilmorin, bowing gallantly over the hand she extended to him.

"Indeed, who would haste to the uncle that may tarry a moment with the niece ?" "M.

l'abbe," she teased him, "when you are in orders I shall take you for my confessor.