Fanny leaned toward him coaxingly as she asked the question.

“Oh yes, I understand,” replied Alfred.

“And you’ll do just as Fanny says, won’t you, dear?” said she, even more caressingly.

“Yes, I will, I promise,” answered Alfred.

“You may kiss me, dear,” said Fanny, leaning toward him, so that the operation need not disarrange her toilet.

Alfred Dinks kept his word; and his mother was perfectly willing to do as she was asked.  She smiled with intelligence whenever she saw her son and his cousin together, and remarked that Hope Wayne’s demeanor did not in the least betray the engagement.  And she smiled with the same intelligence when she remarked how devoted Alfred was to Fanny Newt.

“Can it possibly be that Alfred knows so much?” she asked herself, wondering at the long time during which her son’s cunning had lain dormant.

CHAPTER XXVI.

THE PORTRAIT AND THE MINIATURE.

The golden days of September glimmered through the dark sighing trees, and relieved the white brightness that had burned upon the hills during the dog-days.  Mr. Burt drove into town and drove out.  Dr. Peewee called at short intervals, played backgammon with his parishioner, listened to his stories, told stories of his own, and joined him in his little excursions to the West Indies.  Mrs. Simcoe was entirely alone.

One day Hiram brought her a letter, which she took to her own room and sat down by the window to read.

“SARATOGA.

“DEAR AUNTY,—­We’re about going away, and we have been so gay that you would suppose I had had ‘society’ enough.  Do you remember our talk?  There have been a great many people here from every part of the country; and it has been nothing but bowling, walking, riding, dancing, dining at the lake, and listening to music in the moonlight, all the time.  Aunt Dinks has been very kind, but although I have met a great many people I have not made many friends.  I have seen nobody whom I like as much as Amy Waring or Mr. Lawrence Newt, of whom I wrote you from New York, and they have neither of them been here.  I think of Pinewood a great deal, but it seems to me long and long ago that I used to live there.  It is strange how much older and different I feel.  But I never forget you, dearest Aunty, and I should like this very moment to stand by your side at your window as I used to, and look out at the hills, or, better still, to lie in your lap or on my bed, and hear you sing one of the dear old hymns.  I thought I had forgotten them until lately.  But I remember them very often now.  I think of Pinewood a great deal, and I love you dearly; and yet somehow I do not feel as if I cared to go back there to live.  Isn’t that strange?  Give my love to Grandpa, and tell him I am neither engaged to a foreign minister, nor a New York merchant, nor a Southern planter—­nor to any body else.  But he must keep up heart, for there’s plenty of time yet.  Good-by, dear Aunty.  I seem to hear you singing,