lesser charms.

Quite different was the girl who entered the room a few minutes later.
Hers was a dark olive complexion, face of exquisite contour, great brown
eyes with a wealth of hair to match them and the flush of a rose in her
rounded cheeks. The poise of her girlish figure was gracious and
dignified as the bearing of a queen.

"Morning, Cousin Beth," said Patsy cheerily.

"Good morning, my dear," and then, with a trace of anxiety in her tone:
"What is the news, Uncle John?"

The little man had ignored Patsy's first question, but now he answered
absently, his eyes still fixed upon the newspaper:

"Why, they're going to build another huge skyscraper on Broadway, at
Eleventh, and I see the political pot is beginning to bubble all through
the Bronx, although--"

"Stuff and nonsense, Uncle!" exclaimed Patsy. "Beth asked for news, not
for gossip."

"The news of the war, Uncle John," added Beth, buttering her toast.

"Oh; the war, of course," he said, turning over the page of the morning
paper. "It ought to be the Allies' day, for the Germans won yesterday.
No--by cracky, Beth--the Germans triumph again; they've captured
Maubeuge. What do you think of that?"