And Faith told it with cheeks burning and eyes shining, but yet quite as if she’d been born and brought up in the knowledge.

“It don’t seem to move you much, Faith,” said I, perfectly amazed, although I’d frequently expected something of the kind.

“Well, I may never get it, and so on.  If I do, I’ll give you a silk dress and set you up in a book-store.  But here’s a queerer thing yet.  Des Violets is the way Mr. Gabriel’s own name is spelt, and his father and mine—­his mother and—­Well, some way or other we’re sort of cousins.  Only think, Georgie! isn’t that—­I thought, to be sure, when he quartered at our house, Dan’d begin to take me to do, if I looked at him sideways,—­make the same fuss that he does, if I nod to any of the other young men.”

“I don’t think Dan speaks before he should, Faith.”

“Why don’t you say Virginie?” says she, laughing.

“Because Faith you’ve always been, and Faith you’ll have to remain, with us, to the end of the chapter.”

“Well, that’s as it may be.  But Dan can’t object now to my going where I’m a mind to with my own cousin!” And here Faith laid her ear on the ball of yarn again.

“Hasten, headsman!” said she, out of a novel, “or they’ll wonder where I am.”

“Well,” I answered, “just let me run the needle through the emery.”

“Yes, Georgie,” said Faith, going back with her memories while I sharpened my steel, “Mr. Gabriel and I are kin.  And he said that the moment he laid eyes on me he knew I was of different blood from the rest of the people”—.

“What people?” asked I.

“Why, you, and Dan, and all these.  And he said he was struck to stone when he heard I was married to Dan,—­I must have been entrapped,—­the courts would annul it,—­any one could see the difference between us”—­

Here was my moment, and I didn’t spare it, but jabbed the needle into the ball of yarn, if her ear did lie between them.

“Yes!” says I, “anybody with half an eye can see the difference between you, and that’s a fact!  Nobody’d ever imagine for a breath that you were deserving of Dan,—­Dan, who’s so noble he’d die for what he thought was right,—­you, who are so selfish and idle and fickle and”—­

And at that Faith burst out crying.

“Oh, I never expected you’d talk about me so, Georgie!” said she between her sobs.  “How could I tell you were such a mighty friend of Dan’s?  And besides, if ever I was Virginie des Violets, I’m Faith Devereux now, and Dan’ll resent any one’s speaking so about his wife!”

And she stood up, the tears sparkling like diamonds in her flashing dark eyes, her cheeks red, and her little fist clenched.

“That’s the right spirit, Faith,” says I, “and I’m glad to see you show it.  And as for this young Canadian, the best thing to do with him is to send him packing.  I don’t believe a word he says; it’s more than likely nothing but to get into your good graces.”