"I hope you don't consider me 'raised,'" replied Allison. "You're not going to stop 'mothering' me, are you?"
"I couldn't," was her smiling assurance. "I've got the habit."
He seemed very young as he looked down at her. Woman-like she loved him, through the man that he was, for the child that he had been.
"Come, lad," the Colonel suggested, "it's getting late and we want to be invited again."
Allison closed his violin case with a snap, said good-night to Aunt Francesca, then went over to Rose. "I don't feel like calling you 'Miss Bernard," he said. "Mayn't I say 'Cousin Rose,' as we rejoice in the possession of the same Aunt?"
"Surely," she answered, colouring faintly.
"Then good-night, Cousin Rose. I'll see you soon again, and we'll begin work. Your days of leisure are over now."
Isabel offered him a small, cool hand. Her eyes were brilliant, brought out by the sparkling silver of her gown. She glittered even in the low light of the room. "Good-night, Silver Girl," he said. "You haven't really grown up after all."
When the door closed, Rose gathered up the music he had forgotten, and put it away. Isabel came to her contritely. "Cousin Rose, I'm so sorry I said that! I didn't think!"
"Don't bother about it," Rose replied, kindly. "It was nothing at all, and, besides, it's true."
"'Tell the truth and shame the--family,'" misquoted Madame Bernard. "Age and false hair are not things to be flaunted, Isabel, remember that."
Isabel flushed at the rebuke, and her cheeks were still burning when she went to her room.
"I don't care," she said to herself, with a swift change of mood. "I'm glad I told him. They'd never have done it, and it's just as well for him to know."
Madame Bernard and Rose soon followed her example, but Rose could not sleep. Through the night the voice of the violin sounded through her consciousness, calling, calling, calling--heedless of the answer that thrilled her to the depths of her soul.