At Fernlands the eleven strokes of the grandfather’s clock in the great hall found the gray-eyed lady in the arms of a young fellow who had but that instant bounded lightly up the walk from the sleigh Major Verney had dispatched to Cotesville to meet the Northern Express.  The Major, smilingly awaiting his opportunity to greet the newcomer, ran his eye approvingly over the lines of the well-knit figure and handsome face of the young man.

“Well, Dick,” said the Major, advancing with outstretched hand as the girl flushed prettily and smoothed back the dark mist of hair from her forehead, “how are you, my boy?  Busy, of course.  We read fine things of you in the papers at times.”  Then, as the young man took off his overcoat, “What, sir,” the Major inquired, “do you mean by falling in love with my only niece?  Here my brother writes me that his daughter is engaged to a man who knows me, and will I pack off a carload of testimonials by special messenger indorsing the little rascal who used to steal my apples.  What, sir, do you mean?”

“Well, Major,” Dick answered as he was ushered into the big living-room, his laughing eyes alight with happiness, “she had the Verney eyes, and you remember I always liked them.”  He sank into a chair by Ruth with a smiling glance at the Major.  “It is unusually cold for down here.  There’s a real bracing Northern sting in the air.  And what a snow!  It’s packed down so that the runners fairly flew.  Major, do sit down!”

The Major was still bustling about, urging Ruth into another chair by the fire that he himself might sit by Dick, poking energetically at the blazing logs, and firing a volley of directions at black Sam.

“There!” he exclaimed, finally seating himself.  “Now, sir, relative to this infatuated young person on my left, who has condescended to visit her uncle for the first time since she arrived on the planet.  I met her last night according to telegraphed instructions, and she kept me waiting—­let me see—­”

“Uncle!” protested Ruth, “you’ve added fifteen minutes to that wait every time you’ve mentioned it.”

“My dear child, politeness alone has kept me from naming the full extent of my wait.  If you please, sir,” he turned to Dick, “she was in the clutches of a beggar who obtained twenty-five dollars by a most extraordinary yarn.”

“Twenty-five dollars!” Dick whistled, smiling at the flush that crept up to the gray eyes.  “Was it an aged father this time or a hungry brood of motherless waifs, Ruthie?”

“Dick, listen!” cried the girl.  “Uncle misjudges him.  It was a dear old colored man and he told me the strangest story.”

“You don’t often find a grateful beggar who sends you violets in the morning purchased with some of your own shekels,” said the Major, pinching the flushed cheek.  “Tell him, Ruthie; it was odd, and I believe I’d have done the same thing myself.”

The girl flashed a grateful look at him and then told the story of her purchase of the night before so eloquently that the Major and Dick heard her through with sober faces, secretly touched by its pathos.  “And he must have recognized Uncle,” she ended, “for the violets came this morning with the quaintest card.”