“Yes,” she answered, good-humoredly; “ring the bell.”

An old woman answered it, to whom Mrs. Hepburn said, in a friendly voice, “The box in my desk.”  Adelaide and Ann said, “How do you do, Mari?” When she brought the box, Mrs. Hepburn unlocked it, and produced some yellow letters, which we looked over, picking out here and there bits of Parisian gossip, many, many years old.  They were directed to Cavendish Hepburn, by his friend, the original of the portrait.  But the letters were soon laid aside, and we examined the contents of the box.  Old brooches, miniatures painted on ivory, silhouettes, hair rings, necklaces, ear-rings, chains, and finger-rings.

“Did you wear this?” asked Ann with a longing voice, slipping an immense sapphire ring on her forefinger.

“In Mr. Hepburn’s day,” she answered, taking up a small case, which she unfastened and gave me.  It contained a peculiar pair of ear-rings, and a brooch of aqua-marina stones, in a setting perforated like a net.

“They suit you.  Will you accept such an old-fashioned ornament?  Put the rings in; here Ann, fasten them.”

Ann glared at her in astonishment, and then at me, for the reason which had prompted so unexpected a gift.

“Is it possible that I am to have them?  Why do you give them to me?  They are beautiful,” I replied.

“They came from Europe long ago,” she said.  “And they happen to suit you.”

                ’Sabrina fair,
  Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,
  In twisted braids of lilies knitting
  The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair.’”

“Those lines make me forgive Paradise Lost,” said Adelaide.

“They are very long, these ear-rings,” Ann remarked.

I put the brooch in the knot of ribbon I wore; Mrs. Hepburn joggled the white satin bows of her cap in approbation.

The knocker resounded.  “There is our partner,” she cried.

“It must be late, ma’am,” said Adelaide; “and I suspect it is some one for us.  You know we never venture on impromptu visits, except to you, and our people know where to send.”

“Late or not, you shall stay for a game,” she said, as Ben came in, hat in hand, declaring he had been scouting for us since dark.  Mrs. Hepburn snuffed the candles, and rang the bell.  The small girl, with a perturbed air, like one hurried out of a nap, brought in a waiter, which she placed on the sideboard.

“Get to bed,” Mrs. Hepburn loudly whispered, looking over the waiter, and taking from it a silver porringer, she put it inside the fender, and then shuffled the cards.

“Now, Ann, you may sit beside me and learn.”

“If it is whist, mum, I know it.  I played every afternoon at Hampton last summer, and we spoiled a nice polished table, we scratched it so with our nails, picking up the cards.”

“Young people do too much, nowadays.”

I was in the shadow of the sideboard; Ben stood against it.