room while he peered into the darkness, so that the reproach passed unheeded.

Before she had put her face to the pane her father had dropped the blind that he was holding back.

“Good lud! how the lad has grown!” he said in an astonished whisper.

“Tom! ’tis Tom himself!” cried Betsy, turning from the window and making for the door.

There was a sound of merry voices and many shouts of children’s welcome downstairs—a stamping of feet on the stairs, a stream of questions in various tones of voice, a quiet answer or two, a children’s quarrel in the passage as a boy tried to run in front of a girl. Betsy flung wide the door, crying:

“Tom, brother Tom!”

In another second he was in her arms, kissing her face and being kissed by her without the exchange of a word.

The other members of the family of Linley stood by, the father slightly nervous, fingering an invisible harpsichord, the brothers and sisters callous only when they were not nudging one another lest any detail of the pathetic scene of the meeting of the eldest brother and sister should pass unnoticed.

“Hasn’t he grown!” remarked Mrs. Linley. Some of the flour of the pie which she had been making was on the front of her dress and one of the sleeves. She had transferred a speck or two to her son’s travelling-cloak.

“He hasn’t shaken hands with father yet,” said Master Oziah with the frankness of observant childhood.

“He doesn’t mind; he’s too big for father to thwack!” whispered Master Willie.

“Oh, Tom!—but it was my fault—all my fault!” cried Betsy, releasing her brother, and passing him on to their father almost with the air of introducing the two.

For a moment the musician felt the aloofness of the artist.

“Father—caro padre!” said the boy, who had just returned from Italy.

“Son Tom,” said the father, giving his cheek to be kissed, while he pressed the hand that the boy held out to him.

“What has he brought us, I wonder?” remarked little Oziah to Willie in a moderately low tone.

“Nothing that’s useful, I hope,” said Willie. “People have no business bringing home useful presents.”

“I can’t believe that these big girls are the little sisters I left at home when I set out on my travels,” said Tom, when he had thrown off his travelling-cloak. “Polly? Oh, she is very pretty—yes, in her own way; and I daresay she is as pert as ever.”

“And she needs all her pertness to keep her head above water in such a household!” said Polly.

“But Betsy—oh, what an English sound Betsy has—far sweeter than Bettina, I’ll swear! Oh, Bacco, Betsy is our beauty,” said Tom, looking critically at the blushing girl before him.

“Psha! everybody knows that,” said Polly. “We don’t stand in need of a traveller’s opinion on so plain a matter.”

“You, Tom, are as like Betsy now as two—two roses that have grown on the same stem,” said Mr. Linley.

“Then I cannot without boasting say another word about her beauty,” laughed Tom, making a very Italian bow to the sister whom he loved.

He undoubtedly bore a striking resemblance to her. His complexion was just as exquisitely transparent as hers, and his eyes had the same expression, the same timorous look, that suggested the eyes of a beautiful startled animal—the most wonderful eyes that had ever been painted by Gainsborough.

“And her voice—has it also improved?” asked Tom, turning to their father with the air of an impresario making an inquiry of a trusted critic.

“Look at her face, boy; look in her eyes, and then you will know what I mean when I say that her voice is no more than the expression of her face made audible,” said Mr. Linley. “Look well at her this evening, my son; you will appreciate her beauty now that it is still fresh in your eyes; to-morrow you will have begun to get used to it. Brothers cease to be impressed with the beauty of their sisters almost as quickly as husbands do with the beauty of their wives.”

“Tom is so like Betsy, there is no danger of his forgetting that she is beautiful,” said Polly.

Tom gave a little frown, then a little laugh. His laugh was just as sweet as Betsy’s: both suggested a campanile.

“You have made her a great singer, I hear, sir,” he remarked, when he had kissed her again—this time on the hand.

“She was born a great singer: I have only made her a great artist,” said the father. Then noticing her frown, he cried in quite another tone: “But how is’t with you, my fine fellow? Have you proved yourself to be a genius or only an artist?”

“Ah, you remember how I replied to the bishop who had heard Betsy sing, and thought it only civil to inquire if I was musical also: ‘Yes, sir, we are all geniuses’?”

“It has become the household jest,” said Polly. “But my own belief is, that mother is the only genius among us; you shall taste one of her pies before you are an hour older. If you say that you tasted a better one in all Italy, you will prove yourself no judge of cookery.”

“I should eat that pie even if it should contain not four-and-twenty blackbirds, but as many nightingales—or linnets. Ah, you remember, Betsy, how the name ‘Miss Linnet’ remained with you? Who was it that first called you Miss Linnet?”

“That were a question for the Society of Antiquaries,” said Betsy, “and the bird we are all thinking of is a pie. Hurry to your room, Tom, or I vow there will not be left so much as a clove for you. You knew Polly’s appetite; well, it has improved to the extent of an octave and a half since.”

“Corpo di Bacco! I have no inclination to play second fiddle to an appetite of such compass!” cried Tom, hurrying from the room.

“I sing as Miss Cormorant in the bills when Betsy appears as Miss Linnet,” cried Polly from the lobby.

And then they all talked of Tom—all except the mother, who had gone downstairs to the kitchen. How Tom had grown! How good it was of him to remember through all the stress of foreign travel and foreign study, the household characteristics of the Linleys, of 5, Pierrepont Street, Bath! It seemed so strange—just as strange as if a stranger had come into the house showing himself acquainted with the old family jests. And he had not even forgotten that Polly was pert! Polly held her head high at the thought that he had not forgotten her pertness. How noble it was of him! And yet he must have had a great many more important details to keep in his head.

Maria was thinking of the possibility of a brooch being among the luggage of her newly returned brother—a real Italian brooch, with perhaps a genuine yellow topaz in it, or perhaps a fascinating design done in mosaic, or a shell cameo of the head of Diana, or some other foreign goddess. Little Maria had been thinking of this brooch for some weeks. At times she could scarcely hope that so great a treasure should ever escape the notice of those lines of banditti, who, according to reports that had reached her, contested the passage of any article of value across the Italian frontier. But even admitting the possibility of its safe arrival in England, would not the news of its coming be passed round from highwayman to highwayman until the last chance of its reaching her had fled? Then there were the perils of innkeepers, of inquisitive postboys, of dishonest porters. She had heard of them all, and thus was for weeks in a condition of nervousness quite unusual to her. And now the dreadful thought came to her: “Perhaps he has brought the brooch to Polly, and only a book to