“La, chile,” she exclaimed, settling and patting the cushions of the chair in which he had been sitting, “w’y didn’ you say so befo’?”

“I wasn’t sure that I was standing in the house of my old friend.  I only knew that he lived somewhere in Virginia.”

“He is among those out on the hill behind the orchard,” said Mima, sadly.  Mammy Peggy wiped her eyes, and went about trying to add some touches of comfort to the already perfect room.

“You have no reason to sorrow, Miss Harrison,” said Northcope gently, “for a brother who died bravely in battle for his principles.  Had fate allowed me to be here I should have been upon the other side, but believe me, I both understand and appreciate your brother’s heroism.”

The young girl’s eyes glistened with tears, through which glowed her sisterly pride.

“Won’t you come out and look at his grave?”

“It is the desire that was in my mind.”

Together they walked out, with mammy following, to the old burying plot.  All her talk was of her brother’s virtues, and he proved an appreciative listener.  She pointed out favorite spots of her brother’s childhood as they passed along, and indicated others which his boyish pranks had made memorable, though the eyes of the man were oftener on her face than on the landscape.  But it was with real sympathy and reverence that he stood with bared head beside the grave of his friend, and the tears that she left fall unchecked in his presence were not all tears of grief.

They did not go away from him that afternoon until Mammy Peggy, seconded by Mima, had won his consent to let the old servant come over and “do for him” until he found suitable servants.

“To think of his having known Philip,” said Mima with shining eyes as they entered the new cottage, and somehow it looked pleasanter, brighter and less mean to her than it had ever before.

“Now s’posin’ you’d ‘a’ run off widout seein’ him, whaih would you been den?  You wouldn’ nevah knowed whut you knows.”

“You’re right, Mammy Peggy, and I’m glad I stayed and faced him, for it doesn’t seem now as if a stranger had the house, and it has given me a great pleasure.  It seemed like having Phil back again to have him talked about so by one who lived so near to him.”

“I tell you, chile,” mammy supplemented in an oracular tone, “de right kin’ o’ pride allus pays.”  Mima laughed heartily.  The old woman looked at her bright face.  Then she put her big hand on the girl’s small one.  It was trembling.  She shook her head.  Mima blushed.

Bartley went out and sat on the veranda a long time after they were gone.  He took in the great expanse of lawn about the house, and the dark background of the pines in the woods beyond.  He thought of the conditions through which the place had become his, and the thought saddened him, even in the first glow of the joy of possession.  Then his mind went on to the old friend who was sleeping his last sleep back there on the sun-bathed hill.  His recollection went fondly over the days of their comradeship in Venice, and colored them anew with glory.