She looked a little anxiously at the kitten, who was purring contentedly in Philippa's arms.

"I hope," she added, "it will be a nice, well-behaved cat when it grows up."

"It ought to be the nicest of the three," said Philippa; "that's very certain."

"Why?" asked Maisie.

"Well, you see," said Philippa, with her chin in the air, "it will have such advantages here. It will sleep on my bed, and have cream for its tea, and it will always wear a lovely ribbon on its neck, or perhaps a collar with a bell. And it will have nothing to do but play, and never be with common, low people."

Maisie looked thoughtful.

"The grey kitten's very nice and affectionate," she said, "though it isn't pretty. It won't have advantages though, because it's got to go and do hard work."

"What hard work?" asked Philippa.

"It's going to catch mice for old Sally's Eliza," replied Maisie, "so of course it can't sleep in any one's bed—it will have to be up all night. And I don't suppose it will have meals exactly except what it picks up. And I'm sure it won't wear a collar and a bell, because that would frighten the mice away."

"Blanche will be better off than that," said Philippa; "she'll be a lady."

"We shall be able to see, shan't we," said Maisie, "what sort of cats they are when they grow up. And then we can settle which is the best— Darkie, or Blanche, or the grey one."

"What do you mean by the best?" said Philippa. "Do you mean the prettiest?"

"Oh dear, no," said Maisie. She pondered the question for some minutes, and then added seriously: "I mean the one that's the greatest comfort to the person it belongs to."



CHAPTER FIVE.

THE ROUND ROBIN.

And now that the white kitten was settled in its new home, the time was come for the departure of the grey one, and the day fixed when it should be taken to old Sally's cottage. Maisie felt the parting a good deal, for it seemed to her that it was a very small weak thing to be sent out into the world to earn its living. It would have a very different life to Darkie and Blanche. They could dwell at ease, and need never catch mice except for their own pleasure; but the grey kitten had really hard work before it, and most likely would never be petted again after it left Fieldside. Maisie wondered whether the old cat, Madam, to whom she carefully explained everything, was at all worried and anxious about her children; but if so, she hid her feelings very well. Certainly she looked about a little after the white kitten had gone, and mewed once or twice in an inquiring sort of way, but she did not refuse comfort. On the contrary, when Maisie offered her some fish to distract her mind from her loss, she gobbled it up rather greedily, and even Darkie could not push his round head far into the dish.

"I expect," said Maisie, "if Madam could choose, she'd much rather send Darkie away and keep the grey one; Darkie bothers her so."

It was just after lesson time, and the children were making preparations to start with the kitten for old Sally's cottage. Dennis was tying down the lid of a small hamper, and Maisie stood near, peeping through the crevices to see whether the kitten was comfortable.

"There," said Dennis, as he tied the last knot; "I'm glad it's we that have got to choose, and not Madam, I wouldn't keep this mean-looking kitten for anything. Now Darkie will be a splendid cat."

"Let me carry it," said Maisie eagerly, and hugging the little basket with both arms, she followed Dennis rather sorrowfully out of the door which the kitten was not to enter again.

"I do hope," she said on the way, "that they'll be kind to it."

"Oh, of course they will," said Dennis; "don't you remember old Sally said Eliza was quite silly over animals. That meant kind—extra kind."

Old Sally and her daughter Anne were busy when the children arrived, for they had a job of work given to them by Mrs Solace, who wanted some old cushions re-stuffed. On opening these, they had found that feathers instead of down had been used, and they both had a great deal to say on the subject. It was, however, almost impossible to talk without coughing and choking, for their cottage was quite full of fluff and feathers floating about in the air. The children stood in the doorway, and explained their errand as well as they could.

"They've brought the kitten, mother," screamed Anne.

Old Sally had just re-filled a cushion, and was holding it before her at arm's-length.

"Is it fat enough?" she screamed back at her daughter.

"It isn't fat at all," said Maisie, who with Dennis was untying the hamper; "it's a thin little kitten, but it's very good."

"Dear Miss Maisie," said Anne, with a chuckling laugh, "it's the cushion mother means, not the cat."

What with old Sally's deafness, and the increasing thickness of the air, in which the two old figures were dimly seen as through a woolly veil, conversation was really impossible. There were many questions Maisie would have liked to ask about the kitten's future comfort, but she saw that they would be useless; so she contented herself with quietly saying good-bye to her favourite, and dropping a few secret tears over it. Dennis, however, had made up his mind to know one thing, and he advanced a little way into the cottage, and shouted: "Is Tuvvy at work to-day?"

Anne was seen indistinctly to nod in answer to this. "He's got the sack, though," she said. "He won't be there not after next week."

The blow had fallen! Both the children left the cottage in low spirits, and for some time walked along in silence; Maisie grieving for the kitten, and Dennis with his mind full of Tuvvy's disgrace. He had so hoped Mr Solace would not send him away. And now the worst had come, and soon there would be no Tuvvy in the barn.

They had reached the middle of the rick-yard, and Maisie was casting her usual anxious glances round for the turkey-cock, when Dennis came to a sudden stop, and exclaimed:

"I know what I'll do!"

"What?" said Maisie, looking at him inquiringly. She wished he would not stand still just there, but he spoke in such a determined manner that she knew it must be something important; so she stood still too, and waited for him to speak.

"I shall go and ask Mr Solace to let Tuvvy stop," he said.

Maisie's look changed to one of admiration, and almost of awe. "Shall you, really?" she said softly. "Do you think he will?"

"I don't know," replied Dennis, beginning to walk on very quickly, "but I shall try to make him."

"But," said Maisie, after a minute's thought, "wouldn't it be best to ask Tuvvy first to leave off having bouts?"

Although she was a girl, and younger than himself, Dennis was quite ready to acknowledge that Maisie had very sensible ideas sometimes. He now stopped again, and stared at her. It would certainly be better to get Tuvvy's promise first, but he felt he must carry out the interview alone.

"Well," he said slowly, "if I do, where will you wait? I couldn't do it with you listening. Will you go back to old Sally's?"

But that, Maisie, remembering the fluff, quite refused to do. She would go and see Mrs Solace, she said, and this being settled, she went towards the house, and Dennis turned to the barn where Tuvvy worked.

As he entered, and saw the familiar thin figure bending over the carpenter's bench, he felt excited and nervous. How should he begin? As a rule, he did not talk much during these visits, and that made it more difficult now. He took his usual seat on a chopping-block near, and Tuvvy, after giving him one rapid sidelong glance, continued his work without speaking. He was making a ladder, and just now was arranging a heap of smoothly-turned rungs in neat rows. Dennis thought he had a rather shamefaced air, like the dog Peter when he knew he had done wrong. It was of no use to wait for him to make a remark, so he said carelessly:

"Is that going to be a long ladder?"

"Pretty tol'rable, master," answered Tuvvy, his long lean fingers moving nimbly amongst the pieces of wood.

"Shall you finish it in a week?" was Dennis's next question.

Tuvvy's dark eyes flashed round at him for a second, but he only answered, "Pretty nigh."

Dennis was silent for a little while. Then he gathered his courage for a great effort, for he felt that it was of no use to beat about the bush any longer.

"Mr Tuvvy," he said, "I'm so sorry you're going away."

"Thank ye, master," said Tuvvy; "so be I."

"Why do you?" asked Dennis.

"'Cause the gaffer sacked me," answered Tuvvy.

"But," said Dennis, his courage rising, now that he had got into the thick of it, "he wouldn't want you to go if he could help it. You're a clever workman, aren't you?"

"Folks say so," answered Tuvvy modestly.

"Well," said Dennis, "I mean to ask him to let you stop. Only you must promise me first not to have any more bouts."

Tuvvy was so taken by surprise, that he stopped working and turned his whole face round upon Dennis, who sat, an upright little figure, on the chopping-block, with a flushed and eager face.

"Thank ye kindly, master," he said, after a moment's survey; "you mean well, but 'tain't no use."

"Why not?" asked Dennis, in a resolute voice.

"I couldn't keep that there promise," said Tuvvy, "not if I was to make it. There's times when I can't get past the Cross Keys; I'm drawed into it."

"Why do you pass it, then?" asked Dennis.

"I don't pass it, master, worse luck. I go in."

"But I mean," said Dennis, getting still redder in the face with the effort to explain himself, "why do you go by the Cross Keys at all?"

"Well, I have to," said Tuvvy, "twice in the day. Once of a morning and once of a evening. I live at Upwell, you see, master."

Dennis had never known or cared where Tuvvy lived, and indeed it hardly seemed natural to think of him in any other place than at work in the barn. It was odd to think he had a home in Upwell.

"Then," he said thoughtfully, "you have to walk more than two miles each way."

"All that," said Tuvvy—"more like three."

He bent over his work, and Dennis sat silent and rather despondent, with his eyes fixed on the ground. There was so little chance for Tuvvy, if he really could not pass the Cross Keys without being "drawed in." There seemed nothing more to say. Presently, however, Tuvvy himself continued the conversation.

"Night's the worst," he said, "and winter worse nor any. It's mortal cold working here all day, and a man's spirit's pretty nigh freezed out of him by the time work's done. And then there's the tramp home, and long before I get to the village, I see the light behind the red blind at the Cross Keys. It streams out into the road, and it says: 'Tuvvy,' it says, 'it's warm in here, and you're cold. There's light in here, and a bit of talk, and a newspaper; and outside it's all dark and lonesome, and a good long stretch to Upwell. Come in, and have a drop to cheer you up. You don't need to stop more'n five minutes.' And then—"

Tuvvy stopped, raised his black eyebrows, and shook his head.

"Well?" said Dennis.

"Well, master," repeated Tuvvy, "then I go in."

"And do you come out in five minutes?" asked Dennis.

Tuvvy shook his head again: "It's the red blind as draws me in," he said, "and once I'm in, I stay there."

"Mr Tuvvy," said Dennis, after a pause, with renewed hope in his voice, "I've thought of something. Why don't you go home across the fields? You wouldn't have to pass the Cross Keys then, you see, and wouldn't see the red blind, and it couldn't draw you in."

"There ain't no way out into the road," objected Tuvvy.

"There is," said Dennis; "I've often been. You'd have to cross over part of one of Aunt Katharine's fields, and then there's a stile into the Upwell road. It's as straight as anything."

"Happen Miss Chester mightn't like to see me tramping over her field," said Tuvvy.

"She won't mind a bit. Besides, I'll ask her to let you. So that's all right," said Dennis jumping up, "and I shall go and speak to Mr Solace at once."

He was nearly out of the barn when Tuvvy's voice checked him.

"Hold hard, master," it said; "I ain't given that there promise you was talking on."

"But you will," said Dennis, coming close up to the carpenter's bench, and looking earnestly up into Tuvvy's dark face; "of course you will— won't you?"

Tuvvy made no answer for a moment. He seemed puzzled to account for all this interest on Dennis's part, but at length he held out a hand almost black from hard work, and said:

"Well master, here's my hand on it. I'll do my best."

Dennis put his own into it seriously.

"That's a bargain, Mr Tuvvy," he said. "People always shake hands on bargains. And now it will be all right."

Tuvvy raised his eyebrows doubtfully.

"Whether it is or whether 'tain't," he said, "you meant it kind, and I take it kind, master."

Dennis himself had no doubts at all as he ran across the rick-yard to the farmhouse. Mr Solace was so good-natured, he was always ready to do what he was asked, and Dennis knew quite well that he and Maisie were favourites. He felt still more anxious now that Tuvvy should not be sent away, for since this talk with him, he seemed to have taken his affairs under his protection. Tuvvy seemed to belong to him, and to depend on him for help and advice, and Dennis was determined to do his very best for him. So it was with a feeling of great importance that he entered the housekeeper's room, where he was told that he should find Mrs Solace and his sister. They were both there, and both very busy, for Mrs Solace was making meat-pies, and Maisie, covered from head to foot with a big white apron, was learning how to roll out paste.

"Did you want to see Andrew particularly, my dear?" asked Mrs Solace. "Fact is, he's in the office, over his accounts, and don't want to be disturbed. If it's a message from Miss Chester, you could leave it with me, couldn't you? and I'll be sure he has it."

"It isn't a message from Aunt Katharine," said Dennis. "It's something I must say myself; something very important, indeed. Maisie knows it is," he added, as Mrs Solace still hesitated.

She looked at the children with some perplexity in her good-humoured face. She did not want to disturb Andrew just now, whose temper was seldom ruffled except when he was at his accounts. On the other hand, Dennis and Maisie were both fixing such imploring eyes upon her that she could not bear to say "No."

"Well, then," she said, "you must just go and knock at the door and ask if you may go in. But don't ye stay long, my dear, else Andrew'll be vexed, and it's I who'll bear the blame."

The office, where Mr Solace had retired to struggle with his accounts, was not a very business-like apartment. It was a small room with a door opening into the stable-yard, full of a great variety of articles, such as boots, whips, guns, walking-sticks, and pipes. In the window there was a big writing-table, covered with account-books and papers, and it was here that the farm men came to be paid on Saturday night. From his seat Mr Solace could see all that went on in the stable-yard, and could shout out orders to the men as they passed across it without leaving his chair. That was in summer, but now the window was shut and the room was quite full of the fumes of Mr Solace's pipe, from which he was puffing angry clouds of tobacco, as he frowned over a great leather-bound book in front of him.

He was a man of about fifty, with iron-grey hair and very blue eyes which looked keenly out under bushy brows. They were kindly eyes, but they were eyes which could fix themselves commandingly on man or beast, and seemed used to having their commands obeyed. They were set in a face so bronzed and reddened by an outdoor life, that this colour was all the more striking, except to old Sally, who spoke lightly of them compared to others she "minded" in the family. "They weren't nothing at all to what old Mr Solace's was," she said. "They were blue, if you like."

Biting the top of his quill pen, and stamping his foot, when the figures were too much for his patience, the farmer had just travelled nearly up a long column, when a loud knock was heard at his door.

At first he only grunted impatiently, for he knew that if he let go his calculation for an instant, he was a lost man, and would have to add it all up again. But almost immediately the knock was loudly repeated.

"Come in," he shouted, flinging down his pen and turning angrily towards the door. His gaze was directed to the height of a full-grown person, and he lowered it hastily to the level of Dennis's small round head, and said in a softer tone: "Oh, it's you, is it, my boy."

Dennis marched straight in at once, and stood at the farmer's elbow. He was not a bit afraid of Mr Solace, and had prepared just what he meant to say, so he began without a pause.

"I've come to ask you a favour, please."

"And I wish you'd come at any other time," said Mr Solace good-naturedly; "but as you're here, out with it."

Dennis's favours were usually connected with jackdaws, or rabbits, or puppies, and no doubt this would be something of the same kind.

"It's a bigger one than ever I've asked before," continued Dennis, "and I want it more than anything I've wanted before."

"Fire away!" said the farmer; "only make haste about it, because I'm busy."

"I want you," said Dennis, speaking slowly and solemnly, as he drew up closer, "to let Tuvvy stop."

The farmer's face changed. He gave a long low whistle.

"Did he send you to ask me that?" he said.

"No indeed," replied Dennis indignantly; "I thought of it my very own self. He's promised not to have any more bouts, if you'll keep him on."

Mr Solace got up and stood with his elbow on the mantelpiece, looking down at Dennis.

"Well, my boy," he said, "that's a thing I must say 'No' to. I'm forced to, by Tuvvy himself. I don't want to send him away. I shan't get another such a clever chap in his place."

"Then why do you?" asked Dennis.

"Because I can't put up with him any longer; I've been too soft-hearted already. I've winked at his goings-on again and again, and I've let him off times out of number. But now my mind's made up."

"But he's promised," urged Dennis, "and he's going to walk home the field-way, so as not to pass the Cross Keys. He says it's the red blind that draws him in."

"H'm," said the farmer, with a short laugh. "He don't want much drawing, I fancy. And as for his promises—I've had enough of Tuvvy's promises."

Dennis looked crestfallen. He had not expected this.

"Won't you try him just this once more?" he pleaded.

"Now, look here, Master Dennis," said the farmer; "you know most of my men. They don't call me a hard master, do they?"

"No," replied Dennis; "they say the gaffer's very kind."

"Well, but there's another thing I've got to think of besides kindness, and that's justice. It isn't fair, you see, to the other men to let Tuvvy off. Why, if I did, I shouldn't have a steady workman about the place soon, and serve me right. They'd say: 'There's that chap Tuvvy can do as he likes, and drink and leave his master in the lurch, and yet he's no worse off. Why shouldn't we do the same? What's the good of being sober and steady, and sticking to our work, if we don't get anything by it?'"

"But I'm sure," said Dennis eagerly, "they'd all like Tuvvy to stop."

"That's the worst of it," said Mr Solace, with an annoyed jerk of his head. "I should like him to stop too. He's such a clever rascal with his head as well as his hands. A hint does for him, where another man wants telling all the ins and outs of a thing, and doesn't get it right in the end. Tuvvy's got a head on his shoulders, and turns out his work just as it ought to be. It's a pleasure to see it. But then, perhaps just at a busy time when we're wanting some job he's at, he'll break out and have a regular fit of drinking for the best part of a week, and leave us all in the lurch. It's no use. I can't and won't put up with it, and I oughtn't to."

The farmer spoke as though arguing with his own weakness rather than with Dennis, who now ventured to ask: "If all the others wanted him to stay, would you let him?"

"I'll have nothing to do with asking them," said the farmer, spreading out his hands. "I'll have nothing more to do with Tuvvy at all. I've given him up. Now you run away, my boy, and let me get to my business."

Dennis stood for a minute, half uncertain whether he should put some more questions; but Mr Solace sat down to his desk, and grasped his pen with such determination, that he did not dare to make another attempt, and unwillingly left the office.

He did not, however, entirely give up hope. Dennis was a stubborn little boy, and when he had fixed his mind upon a thing, he did not soon leave off trying to get it. Could Aunt Katharine help him, he wondered, as he and Maisie ran home together. At any rate he would tell her all about it, and ask for her advice. But when she had heard the story, Aunt Katharine did not seem to have much advice to give.

"I don't think you must worry Mr Solace any more, Dennis," she said. "He knows best how to manage his own affairs and his own men. A little boy like you can't understand such things. If the wheelwright behaves badly, of course he must lose his place."

"But," persisted Dennis, "Mr Solace really does want to keep him, I know, only he says it isn't fair to the other men."

"Well, you'd better get them to sign a Round Robin, then," said Miss Chester, laughing; "I can't interfere."

She was hurrying away, as though there were no more to be said on the subject, but Dennis followed her.

"Oh Aunt Katharine," he said earnestly, taking hold of her dress, "do wait a minute, and tell me what you mean by a Round Robin."

Aunt Katharine was always willing to make things clear to the children if she could, and she now sat down patiently to explain to Dennis what a Round Robin was. When he quite understood, he ran quickly in search of Maisie that he might describe it to her before he forgot a word, and get her to help him in preparing one.



CHAPTER SIX.

LOST!

"There!" said Dennis triumphantly, "we've got it right at last."

"There's only one tiny smudge on it," said Maisie, looking anxiously over his shoulder at the Round Robin.

It had cost them nearly two days of earnest effort and repeated failure, for although Aunt Katharine had described exactly how it was to be done, she had left them to carry it out entirely by themselves. It sounded so easy to say: "Take a sheet of cardboard, and draw a large circle on it, leaving room for all the signatures you want. Then write the petition clearly in the middle, and that is a Round Robin." But it was not so easy when you began to do it. First the circle was too large, and then it was too small, then there were mistakes in the spelling, and then there were too many blots; but at last, after wasting four sheets of cardboard, the Round Robin approached perfection. Aunt Katharine came in to see it, and smiled, and said she thought it would do.

"But you've got a good deal before you yet, Dennis," she added. "Do you think you shall be able to get all the men to sign?"

"Every one of them," said Dennis decidedly. "I shall begin with the bailiff, and end with the pig-man. He can't write his name, but he can put a cross."

"It won't matter which you begin or end with," said Maisie, "because there isn't any first and last in the Round Robin."

From this moment all Dennis's energy and interest were spent upon getting the Round Robin signed. He could talk and think of nothing else, but though Maisie was eager for its success too, it did not entirely take her mind from other things. She often thought, for instance, of the two kittens in their new homes, and wondered how they were getting on, and whether Blanche was beginning to be a "comfort" to Philippa. Darkie was certainly growing handsome and more amusing every day, but perhaps he could not exactly be considered a "comfort." Madam, his mother, at any rate did not find him one, and was often very vexed with him, because he would not give up the pranks and follies of childhood. She could no longer put up with it patiently, when he pounced upon her tail if she happened to whisk it, or played leap-frog over her back like a small black goblin. On such occasions she would spit at him angrily, and box his ears with the whole strength of her outstretched arm, but Darkie did not care a bit. He must play with some one, and as Peter the dog would not notice him, there was no one left but Madam. Dennis and Maisie were quite ready to have a game, but they were not to be compared to cats for fun and frolic, and besides, they began to have some tiresome ideas about training and education. Darkie must be taught to beg like Peter. Every morning, before he was allowed to taste his breakfast, he was made to go through certain exercises.

"Beg, Darkie, beg," Maisie would say, holding the plate high above his head; and then Dennis would place him forcibly down on his hind-legs, and lift up his front paws. Darkie was a cunning cat, and he soon found that begging was to his advantage, so he learned his lesson quickly, but it was only one of many which followed, and he got very tired of them.

"Darkie can beg," said Maisie, when she next saw Philippa. "How does Blanche get on?"

Philippa had driven over to Fieldside with her mother one bright afternoon in April, and now she and Maisie were in the garden, Dennis as usual being absent on business connected with the Round Robin. Maisie had been very pleased to see Philippa when she first arrived, for she wanted to hear about the white kitten, and she looked forward to a pleasant talk with her. Before she had been there five minutes, however, it was easy to see that she was not in a nice mood. That was the worst of Philippa, Maisie always found. You could never take her up just at the point you left her; she might be agreeable, and she might be just the opposite. To-day she had her grown-up manner, and was full of little affected airs and graces, and Maisie, glancing at her once or twice, saw the reason of it. Philippa was wearing a new hat of the latest fashion, covered with the most beautiful drooping feathers, and she could not forget it for a moment.

"If I can find Darkie," repeated Maisie, "you should see him beg. He does it most beautifully."

"Fancy!" said Philippa, with a slight drawl and a little laugh. "Well, Blanche doesn't need to beg for anything. She gets all she wants without that.—Where's Dennis?"

Maisie repeated the story of Tuvvy and the Round Robin, and Philippa laughed again.

"What odd things you do," she said. "Mother says you're not a bit like other people."

Maisie had been searching in vain for Darkie in all his usual haunts, and calling him at intervals, but no kitten appeared; there was only old Madam curled up in the sun, blinking in lazy comfort.

"I'm afraid I shan't find him," she said, with a disappointed face. "He's such a cunning cat. He knows we want to teach him things, so he often hides. Very likely he's watching us now, somewhere quite near. But I did so want you to see him beg."

"Why do you teach him things?" asked Philippa, "It must be a great trouble to you, and he doesn't like it either."

"Oh, but it's good for him to learn," said Maisie. "It makes him obedient and well-behaved.—Don't you teach Blanche anything?"

"Oh dear, no," said Philippa. "She would scratch me if I tried, directly."

Maisie looked grave. "Do you think Blanche is growing a nice cat?" she asked presently.

Philippa tossed her head, and made all the feathers on her hat wave.

"She ought to be," she said, "for she has all sorts of advantages. She's got bells, and ribbons, and a clockwork mouse, but she hasn't a very nice disposition. She often scratches. Miss Mervyn's quite afraid of her, and mother would send her away at once if she wasn't mine."

Maisie sighed. "I'm sorry," she said, but in her own mind she felt sure that the white kitten was not properly managed.

"I wonder," she added aloud, "how the grey kitten will turn out. Aunt Katharine's going in to Upwell to-morrow, and she's promised to call at the tinsmith's and ask after it."

Philippa yawned, and did not seem to feel much interest in the grey kitten.

"How do you like my hat?" she asked, with a sudden liveliness in her voice. Before Maisie could answer, Aunt Katharine called the children from the drawing-room window. Mrs Trevor was going away, and just as they were seated in the carriage Dennis appeared, rather hot, but glowing with triumph.

"Half of them have signed," he said, waving the Round Robin in the air as he approached. Philippa leaned back languidly beside her mother, and gave a little affected wave of the hand to her cousins as she drove away.

"What's the matter with Philippa?" asked Dennis. "She's got something new on, I suppose."

Without waiting for an answer, he proceeded to tell all he had done that afternoon. No one had refused to sign, although some of the men had a good deal to say before they did so, and others looked as though they did not understand the Round Robin very clearly.

"But I think it will be all right," finished Dennis; "and if I get them all, Mr Solace can't refuse to let Tuvvy stop, can he?"

Maisie agreed rather absently, for she was still thinking over her talk with Philippa. The white kitten's home did not seem to have turned out very well so far, and she had expected it to be the best. Perhaps the grey kitten's humble abode would be happier, after all, than Haughton Park.

"Madam," she said, turning to the old cat, who had chosen a sunny spot on the window ledge, and was taking a nap, "I've got some news for you. Aunt Katharine's going to call at the tinsmith's—that's where old Sally's Eliza lives, you know—and ask after your grey kitten."

"She doesn't care," said Dennis, laughing contemptuously, but Maisie knew Madam was pleased, for she tucked her front paws under her and purred. She would no doubt be anxious to hear about her kitten, and the next afternoon, when the time came to expect Aunt Katharine back from Upwell, Maisie stood waiting in the hall with the old cat tucked under her arm. Madam should hear the news directly it came. It seemed a long time in coming, and even when at last Aunt Katharine drove up to the door, she had so many parcels to look after, and so much to say about them, that Maisie could not ask any questions. She followed her aunt into the sitting-room, with Madam still clutched tightly to her side.

"What is it, Maisie dear?" said Miss Chester. "Oh, the kitten, to be sure. I went to see it, but I'm sorry to tell you that they're afraid it has run away."

At this sad news Madam struggled so violently that Maisie was obliged to let her slip down to the floor. Run away! That was the last thing Maisie had thought of.

"Oh Aunt Katharine," she cried, "how did it run away? Why did they let it?"

But there was not much to be told about this. It was supposed that the kitten had run through the shop out into the street, and lost its way. At any rate, it had disappeared, and the tinsmith's wife was very sorry.

"Then," said Maisie, "it's lost! She might have taken more care of it. I wish we hadn't given it to her!"

Poor little grey kitten! Homeless and helpless in the wide world! It was so sad to think of it, that Maisie could not help crying, in spite of Aunt Katharine's attempts to comfort her.

"After all," she sobbed out, "it hasn't got a home at all, and we did take such trouble to find it one."

"Well, darling," said her aunt, "we must hope it has got a good home still. Very likely some kind person found it, and took care of it."

"Do you really think so?" said Maisie, rubbing her eyes and looking up with a gleam of hope; "but perhaps," she added sorrowfully, "an unkind person met it."

Aunt Katharine smiled and kissed her little niece.

"Unfortunately, there are unkind people in the world, dear Maisie," she said; "but I don't think there are many who would hurt a little harmless kitten. So we must take all the comfort we can, and perhaps some day we shall find it again."

Maisie did her best to look on the bright side of the misfortune, but she could not help thinking of all the dangers the grey kitten was likely to meet. There were so many dogs in Upwell, dogs like Snip and Snap who delighted in chasing cats. There were carts and carriages too, and many things which the kitten was far too young to understand. Its ignorance of the world would lead it into all sorts of perils, and there was little chance that it would ever be heard of again. She tried to break the bad news as gently as possible to Madam, who seemed to listen with indifference, and presently fell off to sleep, as though there were no such thing as lost kittens in the world. Dennis also did not show very much concern; but he was just now so busy with other matters that perhaps this was not surprising.



CHAPTER SEVEN.

FOUND!

Meanwhile, what had become of the grey kitten? To learn this we must go back to the time when it began its life in the tinsmith's house at Upwell under the care of old Sally's Eliza. It was kept in the kitchen at first, but by degrees, as it got used to the place, it was allowed to run about where it liked, and its favourite room was the little back parlour opening into the shop. Now the shop was forbidden ground, and it was always chased back if it tried to enter: so perhaps it was for this very reason that it seemed to have fixed its mind on doing it, and one afternoon the chance came. Its mistress was busy behind the counter serving some customers: the parlour door was open; no one noticed the grey kitten, and it marched boldly in.

Pleased to find itself in the midst of so many new and shining things, it played about happily for some time, trying to catch the merry shadowy figures which danced on all the bright surfaces around. It was great fun at first, to make springs and dashes at them with its soft little paws, but finding they were never to be caught, it got tired, and looked about for fresh amusement. Unluckily its eye fell on the open door leading into the busy street, and without a thought of fear it trotted out, and cantered, tail on high, gaily down the pavement.

Too young to understand that it was in the midst of dangers, it saw nothing to alarm, and much that was amusing in all it passed. Now and then it stopped on its way to play with a straw, or chase a fly, and by degrees got a long distance from the tinsmith's shop. It was now late in the afternoon, a drizzling rain had begun to fall, and it was so dull and cold that it was almost like winter. The kitten began to feel wet and miserable. It looked round for shelter and warmth, shook one little damp paw, and gave a tiny mew.

"Hulloa!" cried a rough loud voice, "what's this?" A rough hand grasped it, and held it up high above the ground.

A troop of boys was pouring out from a school-house near, shouting, whistling, calling out to each other, and making the place echo with their noise. The one who had seized the kitten was a big stout fellow of about fourteen, with red hair and small greenish eyes.

"Who wants a cat to make into pies?" he bawled at the top of his voice, holding his prize above the crowd of boys who gathered round him. The kitten, its little weak body dangling helplessly, turned its terrified eyes downwards on all the eager faces.

"Who'll buy?" cried the boy again.

"Mi-auw," said the kitten piteously.

"Give yer five marbles for it, Bill!"

"Give yer tuppence."

"Give yer a lump of hardbake."

One after another the shrill voices sounded above the general noise and clatter, but Bill shook his head.

"Not near enough," he said; "and come to think of it, I shall keep it myself, and have some sport with it. We'll have a cat-chase, sure's my name's Bill."

As he spoke, another boy joined the group. He was much smaller than Bill, slight and thin, with a brown face and very twinkling dark eyes. His clothes were poor, and there was more than one hole in the ragged jacket buttoned tightly round him.

"I'll give yer my knife for't, Bill," he said quickly.

This was a good offer. Bill hesitated; but casting a glance at the boy's dark eager face, he exclaimed:

"Ah, it's you, is it, Dan Tuvvy; then don't you wish you may get it? I'll just keep it myself."

"'Tain't yourn," said Dan shrilly.

"'Tain't yourn, anyhow," said Bill, with a glare in his green eyes.

The small boy's features worked with excitement. "I'll fight yer for it, then," he said, doubling his fists, and at this there was a loud laugh from the others, for he was about half Bill's size.

"Go it, Tuvvy," cried one, patting him on the back; "go in and win."

"I ain't a-goin' to fight a little chap like you," said Bill, moving off sullenly with the kitten under his arm. "So don't you think it."

"You give me the cat, then," said Dan, following him. "'Ere's my knife, with three blades, and on'y one broke."

"Git out with yer," said Bill contemptuously. "I tell yer I'm a-goin' to have a cat-chase with this 'ere kitten. So no more bother about it."

"You're afraid," snarled Dan, running along by his side. "I wouldn't be a big chap like you, and be afraid—that I wouldn't."

"Take that, then," said Bill, turning suddenly, "if you will have it;" and he gave the small boy a blow which struck him to the ground.

In a moment he was up again, quite undaunted.

"Come on, then," he cried, doubling his fists and dancing round his enemy, "if you aren't afraid."

"A fight! a fight!" sounded from all sides; and there seemed no doubt of it, for Bill's temper was roused.

"Ketch 'old for a minnit," he said, holding out the kitten, for which a dozen grimy hands were outstretched; "'twon't take long—"

So all the boys thought. It would be short but exciting, for the two were old enemies, and likely to fight with spirit. They placed themselves in a ring, with hoarse shouts of encouragement and approval, and the fight began; the kitten adding its plaintive mew from time to time to the general noise.

At first it seemed that one blow from Bill's heavy hand would be enough to finish the affair; but it was soon evident that Dan's lean figure and nimble movements were greatly to his advantage. He sprang about in such a swift and agile manner, that he seemed everywhere at once; and while Bill was turning to deal a blow, or to catch hold of him, he had ducked his small black head and escaped. Buttoned tightly in his narrow jacket, which he had not taken off, his straight thin figure offered nothing for the hand to grasp, so that it was like trying to lay hold of a wriggling, slippery eel. It was certainly a much better fight than could have been expected from the unequal size of the rivals, and Bill's face grew a deep red, as much with rage as with his vain efforts to close with Dan, who skipped round him breathless but full of spirit. Suddenly, however, while the excitement was at its height, there came a cry of alarm from the onlookers, "The bobby! the bobby!"

A blue uniform turned the corner. The crowd split up, and vanished like magic as the policeman came towards them. Bill turned away sulkily, and Dan seizing the kitten, which had been dropped on the ground, ran off at the top of his speed.

Without turning his head, to see if his enemy was in pursuit, he sped down the street past the school-house, clasping the kitten to his breast. Soon he had left the shops and busy part of the town behind him, and reached the outskirts, where the houses were poor and mean, and there were ragged people standing about on the door-steps. He gave a quick glance over his shoulder now, and seeing no sign of Bill or the policeman, slackened his pace, loosened the tight pressure of his hand on the kitten, and stroked it gently.

"Poor little kit," he said, "nice little kit. How pleased Becky'll be with it."

It was hard to say whether Dan or the kitten was most exhausted by all they had been through. His fight, his rapid run, and the excitement of the whole affair had made him so breathless, that he was glad to lean against a lamp-post and pant. As for the grey kitten, it lay almost lifeless on his breast, its eyes closed, its little body quite limp, and its heart beating so faintly that it could hardly be felt. The boy looked down at it with pity.

"Looks pretty bad," he murmured; "they've mauled it about so. P'r'aps a drop of milk would set it up."

Urged by this thought, he made an effort to go on again at a slower pace, still panting a good deal, and presently reached a row of small cottages, one of which he entered. A child's voice from a dark corner of the poorly-furnished kitchen cried, as he opened the door, "Mother, it ain't father; it's Dan;" and a woman, who was bending over a pot on the fire, turned towards him.

"Well," she said fretfully, "what makes you so late? It's bad enough to have your father coming in at all hours and wanting his supper."

Dan made no answer, but hurried up to the corner from which the child's voice had sounded. "See here, Becky," he said softly; "see what I've brought you!"

The child, a girl of about eight years old, raised herself eagerly on the hard couch on which she was lying. She was very like Dan, with the same brown skin and dark eyes, but the eyes had no merry twinkle in them. Her face was thin and drawn, and had the appealing look which comes of suffering borne with patience.

"Is it a rabbit, Dan?" she asked, peering at the soft furry thing in her brother's arms.

"It's a little cat," said Dan, putting the kitten gently down by her side, "as Bill was going to ill-treat."

Becky touched the kitten with her thin fingers. "Its eyes is shut," she said. "Oh Dan, I'm feared it's dead."

The woman had now drawn near to look at the kitten too. She had a fair skin and very pale blue eyes, which were always wide open, as though she were surprised at something; when this expression changed, it became a fretful one, which had also got into the tone of her voice.

"Give us a drop o' milk, mother," said Dan; "that'll do it good."

"Milk indeed!" said Mrs Tuvvy; "and what next? Where's the money to come from to buy milk for cats, when goodness knows if we shall soon have bit or drop to put into our own mouths?"

Neither of the children took any notice of their mother's remarks, or answered the questions which she continued to put.

"How do you suppose we're going to live, now yer father's got turned off? Who's a-goin' to pay the doctor's bill, I should like to know?"

Dan rose and fetched from the table a small basin covered with a saucer.

"That's yer supper," said Mrs Tuvvy mournfully. "You ain't never goin' to give it to the cat! Well, you won't get no more."

Dan knelt by the couch, and tried to put a little warm milk into the kitten's mouth with the spoon, but its teeth were firmly shut.

"You open its mouth, Dan, and I'll feed it," said Becky eagerly. "There, it swallowed that—now some more. See; it's better already."

For the kitten had opened its eyes, and given itself a little stretch. Soon it was able to lap some milk out of the saucer, and to eat some crumbled bread.

"Ain't it a little dear?" said Becky, her thin face lighted up with pleasure. "Oh Dan, it's purring! It must be quite well, mustn't it?"

"I expect it'll want a good long sleep first," said Dan, looking gravely at the kitten, which had curled itself up by Becky's side, and begun a faint little song of thankfulness; "it's been through a deal."

He took his neglected supper, and sat down to eat it at the foot of Becky's couch, while Mrs Tuvvy returned to her cooking at the fire, still grumbling half aloud. There was not much bread and milk, and Dan, who always had a good appetite, was unusually hungry after his exertions that afternoon. He had been through a deal, as well as the kitten. But by dint of talking to his sister between each spoonful, he managed to eke out the meal, and make it seem much more. Becky listened with the most eager interest, meanwhile, to all the details of the fight, the policeman, and the escape of Dan with the kitten. When there was no more to tell, and very little more to eat, she leaned back on her couch and sighed.

"He's a reg'lar bad un, that Bill!" she said presently. "Will he want to fight again?"

Dan shook his head. "I shan't come across him no more," he said; "not now I'm going to a place."

"I forgot," said Becky wearily. "Oh Dan, how long the days'll be when you don't come home to dinner. Whatever shall I do?"

"Why," said Dan soothingly, "you won't be alone now. You'll have the kit."

Becky gave a faint little smile.

"I mean to get you a good long bit of string," went on Dan, "and tie a cork to the end, and then, you see, you'll bounce it about for the kit to play with, and carry on fine, without moving."

"I suppose it'll get to know me after a bit, won't it?" said Becky, evidently pleased with Dan's idea.

"Just about," answered her brother decidedly. Becky looked down fondly at the small grey form on her arm.

"Dr Price's dogs came in with him to-day," she said, "but they mustn't come in no more now. They'd worry it to death. Mother told him to-day," she added in a lower tone, "as how she couldn't pay his bill, because of father."

"What did he say?" asked Dan.

"He said, 'That's a bad job, Mrs Tuvvy, but it can't be helped.'"

"Did he say you were getting better?" asked Dan again, scraping his basin carefully round with his spoon.

"He said I wanted plenty of rest, and plenty of nourishing food," said Becky. "What's nourishing food, Dan?"

"Nice things," said Dan, balancing his spoon on the edge of his basin, and smacking his hungry lips; "chickens, and jellies, and pies, and such like."

"Oh," said Becky, with a patient sigh. "Well, we shan't have no money at all now, so we can't get any of 'em."

"I shall get six shillings a week when I begin work," said Dan; "and there's what mother gets charing. But then there's the rent, you see, and father getting nothing—"

He broke off, for the door opened, and Tuvvy himself appeared with his basket of tools on his shoulder. The children looked at him silently as he flung himself into a chair, but his wife began immediately in a tone of mild reproachfulness.

"Yer supper's been waiting this ever so long, and it wasn't much to boast of to begin with, but there—I s'pose we may be thankful to get a bit of dry bread now."

She poured the contents of the saucepan into a dish, sighing and lamenting over it as she did so.

"'Tain't what I've been used to, as was always brought up respectable, and have done my duty to the children. And there's the doctor's bill—I s'pose he won't come to see Becky no more till that's paid—and there she is on her back a cripple, as you may call it, for life p'r'aps. And what is it you mean to turn to, now you've lost a good place?"

As long as there was a mouthful of his supper left, Tuvvy preserved a strict silence; but when his plate was empty, he pushed it away, and said grimly, "Gaffer's goin' to let me stop on."

"Stop on!" repeated Mrs Tuvvy. She stopped short in her progress across the kitchen, and let the empty plate she was carrying fall helplessly at her side. "Stop on!" she repeated.

"Ain't I said so?" answered Tuvvy, pressing down the tobacco in his pipe with his thumb.

Mrs Tuvvy seemed incapable of further speech, and stood gazing at her husband with her mouth partly open. It was Becky who exclaimed, with a faint colour of excitement in her cheek, "Oh father, what made him?"

"Do tell us, father," added Dan, touching him gently on the arm.

Tuvvy looked round at the boy's earnest face, and then down at the table, and began to draw figures on it with the stem of his pipe. Mrs Tuvvy hovered a little nearer, and Becky sat upright on her couch, with eagerness in her eyes as her father began to speak.

"It was along of a little gentleman, Dennis Chester his name is, who used to come and see me work. He asked the gaffer, and gaffer said 'No.' So then he says, 'Will you let him stop,' says he, 'if the others are agreeable?' and to that the gaffer says neither yes nor no. But this morning he sends for me, and 'Tuvvy,' he says, 'I've had a Round Robin about you.' 'And what sort of a bird is that, master?' says I. ''Tain't a bird at all,' he says, 'it's this,' and then he showed it me."

"What ever was it?" asked Dan, as his father paused.

Tuvvy made a large circle in the air with the stem of his pipe.

"'Twas a round drawed like that on a bit of card, and inside of it was wrote as follers: 'We which have signed our names, ask Mr Solace to keep Mr Tuvvy in his service.' All the men's names was round the outside, and the little gentleman's name as well."

"What did Mr Solace say?" asked Dan.

"He said, 'You ain't deserved it, Tuvvy.'"

"No more yer 'ave," said Mrs Tuvvy, regaining her speech.

"But," continued her husband, "the gaffer went on to say that, along of Master Chester, who'd taken such a lot of trouble, he'd give me another chance. So that's all about it."

"And in all my born days," broke out Mrs Tuvvy, "I never heard of anything so singuller. Whatever made Master Chester take such a fancy to you, I wonder?"

"So I'm to stop on," continued Tuvvy, putting his pipe in his mouth, and turning his back on his wife.

"And I hope," said poor Mrs Tuvvy, beginning to cry a little from the relief of the good news, "I do hope, Benjamin, as it'll be a lesson as you'll take to 'art, and keep away from the drink; and if ever a man had reason to keep steady, you 'ave, with Dan growin' up, and Becky's doctor's bill to pay, and—" Mrs Tuvvy did not speak angrily, or raise her voice above a soft complaining drawl; but it seemed to have a disturbing effect upon her husband, who, when she reached this point, sprang up and flung himself towards the door.

"Look, father," said Becky's childish voice from her corner. "See here what Dan's brought me!"

"Filling the house with cats and dogs and rubbish," mourned Mrs Tuvvy, joining the remark to her interrupted sentence.

"We ain't got no dogs, anyhow, mother," said Dan, as his father turned from the door and went up to Becky's side; "a morsel of a kitten won't eat much. She'll have a bit of my supper till she's older, and then she'll catch mice and get her own living."



CHAPTER EIGHT.

BECKY.

"It seems as if it had brought luck, don't it?" said Becky.

She was lying on her hard little sofa, with her hands clasped behind her head, and her eyes fixed on the grey kitten, who was playing all sorts of pranks in a spot of sunlight it had found on the floor. There was a smile on her thin face as she watched the little creature's merry antics, and it was indeed wonderful to see how much amusement it was able to find all by itself. First it chased its own tail round and round so fast, that it made one giddy to look at it; then it pounced at its own shadow, and darted back sideways in pretended fear; then it rolled over on its back, and played with its own furry toes. It was a week now since Dan had brought it home, forlorn and miserable, and it had quite forgotten its troubles, and was happy all day long. Even when there was not much for dinner—and that did happen sometimes, in spite of Becky's care—it always purred its little song of thankfulness, and was ready to be pleased, for it had a meek and grateful nature.

Dan, who was sitting at the foot of Becky's couch, with his feet stretched out in front of him, as though he were very tired, looked up as his sister spoke.

"What luck?" he asked sleepily.

Becky turned her dark eyes upon him.

"I'm sorry I waked you," she said. "I meant, because you brought the kit home the same night father wasn't turned off."

Dan nodded seriously.

"It's all been better since," went on Becky. "Father brings his money home, and mother don't worry, and we have dinner every day, and I do think my back don't go all on aching so bad as it did."

"If you was to get quite well, it'd be luckier still," said Dan.

"P'r'aps I shall," said Becky wistfully. "I dreamed ever so beautiful last night, that you and me was dancing to the organ in the street—the one as plays 'Pop goes the Weasel.' When I woke, I cried a bit, because it wasn't true. Do you think as it'll ever come true?"

"Just about," said Dan, rousing himself to speak with confidence.

"If so be as it does," continued Becky, "it'll be along of what the little gentleman at Fieldside did for father. If father hadn't kept his place, I couldn't got well, because of paying the doctor and the nourishing things."

"I think of that a deal too," said Dan; "it's all owin' to him."

"If there was ever anything we could do to please him," said Becky, "wouldn't we be glad! He must be such a very kind little gentleman."

Dan shook his head decidedly.

"'Tain't likely," he said. "He belongs to rich folks, him and his sister. They don't want nought from the like of us."

"Well, I'm sorry," said Becky, with a sigh. "I think over it a deal when I'm alone, and sort of make plans in my head; but, of course, they ain't real."

Poor Becky had plenty of opportunity for making plans in her head, for since a year ago she had been alone nearly all day. Before that she had been as gay and lively as the kitten itself, and as fond of play, but one unlucky day she had fallen down some stone steps and hurt her back. All her games were over now: she must lie quite still, Dr Price said, and never run about at all, for a long time. That was a new thing for Becky, who had scarcely known what it was to sit still in her life out of school hours; but her back hurt her so much that she was obliged to give up trying to do all the active things she had been used to, one by one. Her father made her a little couch, and on this in her dark corner she passed many weary hours alone, watching the hands travel round the face of the Dutch clock, and longing for the time for Dan to come home and talk to her. Dan was her chief friend, for though father was very kind, he went early to work, and sometimes came back very late, so that she saw little of him; and as for mother, poor mother went out charing, and was so tired in the evening, that she generally dropped off to sleep directly she had washed up the tea-things.

So Becky's life was lonely, and often full of pain, which was the harder to bear because she had no companion to cheer her and help her to forget it. She even grew to look forward to Dr Price's visits, short as they were, for the day did not seem quite so long when he had clattered in with his dogs at his heels, and spoken to her in his loud kind voice. He was a nice gentleman, she thought, though he did not cure the pain in her back. Besides Dr Price there was only Dan, and when on leaving school Dan got a place as gardener's boy, Becky felt sad as well as pleased, for he would now be away all day.

Just at this fortunate moment, when it was so much needed, the grey kitten had arrived, to be her friend and playfellow, and to comfort her with its coaxing ways. It was, as Dan had said, not nearly so dull now. The kitten shared her meals, played all manner of games with her, almost answered her when she talked to it, and when it was tired would jump up to her shoulder and snuggle itself to sleep. The feeling of the warm soft fur against her cheek was so soothing, that often at such times she would take a nap too, and wake up to find that quite a long while had passed without her knowing it.

So, as she told Dan, it had all been better since the kitten came, and somehow it seemed to make a part of all the fancies and thoughts that passed through her mind, as she lay dreaming, yet awake, on her couch. Becky had never made "plans in her head," as she called them, while she was well and strong, and could run about all day. But now that her limbs had to be idle, her mind began to grow busy, and though she could not move out of the dusky kitchen, she took long journeys in fancy, and saw many strange things with her eyes fast shut. Some of these she would describe to Dan, and some she kept quite to herself; but now, since hearing of Dennis Chester's Round Robin, they all took one form. They were always connected with him or his sister, and what he had done for her father, and curiously enough the grey kitten seemed to belong to them, and she seldom thought of one without the other. If it could have spoken, how many interesting facts it could have told her about its life at Fieldside with Dennis and Maisie! Perhaps its little purring song was full of such memories, as it lay pressed up so close to Becky's cheek. At any rate it contrived in some way to get into most of her dreams, whether asleep or awake. But though her life was on the whole happier than it had been, there were still some very hard days for Becky to bear, days when the kitten's merriest gambols were not enough to make her forget her pain.

They were generally days when Mrs Tuvvy had "run short," as she called it, and left very little for dinner, so that; Becky grew faint and low for want of food. For Mrs Tuvvy, even when her husband brought home his wages regularly, was not a good manager. On Saturday night and Sunday she would provide a sort of feast, and have everything of the best. After that the supplies became less and less each day, until on Friday or Saturday there was not much besides bread and cheese, or a red herring, until Tuvvy brought home his wages again. On such uncertain fare poor Becky did not thrive, and she always knew that towards the end of the week she should have a "bad day" of pain and weariness.

"There ain't much dinner for yer," said Mrs Tuvvy one morning as she stood ready to go out charing. "I've put it on the shelf. Don't you go giving any to that foolish kitten, and I'll see and bring summat home for supper."

The door banged, and Becky was alone. She and the kitten would be alone now until five o'clock, and must pass the time as they could. The morning went quickly enough, and when it was nearly one o'clock the kitten, who knew it was dinner-time, began to mew and look up at the shelf.

Becky sighed a little as she took down the mug and plate. There certainly was not "much," as Mrs Tuvvy had said, and, moreover, what there was did not look tempting, for there was only a little watery milk and a piece of hard bread and cheese.

"I wish we had nourishing things for dinner, kitty," she said, as she poured some milk into a saucer, and crumbled some bread into it. "You'd like pies and chickens and such, shouldn't you? and so should I. I don't seem to care about bread and cheese."

The kitten ate up its portion eagerly and looked for more, with a little inquiring mew.

"No, no, Kitty," answered Becky, "there ain't no more to-day. To-day's Friday, you know. We'll have to wait and see what mother brings back for supper. P'r'aps it'll be fried fish or sausages—think of that! You must wash your face now, and go to sleep, and the time'll soon pass."

The kitten soon took the last part of this advice, and curled itself into a soft little ball beside its mistress, but somehow Becky could not sleep this afternoon. The sofa seemed to be harder than usual, full of strange knobs and lumps that were not generally there. Whichever way she tried to lie was more uncomfortable than the last; the room felt hot and stifling, the rain pattered with a dull sound against the window, and her back began to ache badly. Presently she left off trying to go to sleep, and a few tears dropped on to the kitten's furry back. It would be such a long time before any one came home!

Just then a horse's hoofs clattered down the street, and there was a smart rap on the door. It was flung open, and on the threshold stood Dr Price, booted and spurred, the eager white faces of Snip and Snap in the background, with their tongues lolling out thirstily. Poor Becky clutched her kitten to her breast in terror.

"Oh," she cried, "the dogs! Don't let 'em come in. I've got a cat!"

But it was too late. Snip and Snap were in already, running round the kitchen in search of game, sniffing and poking their black noses everywhere. In another minute Becky felt sure they would leap on the sofa, and snatch the kitten from her.

"Oh, do send 'em out," she cried in an agony. "They'll kill it."

"Not they," said the doctor soothingly. "Don't you be afraid. We'll soon settle 'em.—Here, Snip, Snap, come out of that, you rascals."

It was not, however, settled very soon. Becky lay trembling on her couch, while Dr Price gave chase round the kitchen to the dogs, lashing at them with his whip, stumbling over chairs, and giving loud and sudden exclamations as they continually escaped his grasp. At last, however, he caught them, and with one white body dangling from each hand, carried them to the door, threw them out, and shut it. Then he straightened himself, wiped his forehead with his handkerchief, and cast a glance at his patient.

"Little beggars!" he said half admiringly. But now that the danger was over, Becky broke down entirely, and the doctor was dismayed to see that she was sobbing violently, and could not say a word. He strode across the room, and put his arm gently round her.

"It's all right, you know, Becky," he said kindly; "the kitten's all right. You mustn't cry so now. They frightened you, didn't they? But they shan't come in again."

Becky struggled with her tears, and after a while she was able to say that 'twarn't only the dogs, but her back was a bit bad to-day, and she didn't seem to be able to help crying.

"H'm," said the doctor, pulling his hay-coloured moustache thoughtfully, and glancing at the empty plate. "What time did you have dinner?"

"About one," said Becky faintly; "but I didn't just seem to care about it."

"But I daresay you could fancy something now, couldn't you?" said Dr Price, getting up. "Something very nice and hot. I'll be back in a minute. Don't you mind the dogs; they can't get in."

In a very short space of time he was out of the door and back again, followed, not by the dogs, but by a boy from the cook-shop, carrying a covered dish.

"Now," he said, "you just set to work on this, and you'll feel ever so much better."

Becky's eyes brightened at the smell of the savoury food. Hot roast mutton and potatoes seemed almost too good to be eaten all by herself; but she did not hesitate long, and began her meal with evident enjoyment. Dr Price sat near, whistling very softly to himself, and sometimes leaving off to smile a little under his light moustache, as Snip and Snap continued to hurl themselves with hoarse cries against the door.

"Well," he said, as Becky lingered over the last piece on her plate, "how do you like my physic? Is it good?"

"It's beautiful, sir," answered Becky, "and it's done me a deal of good; but might I give this bit to the kitten? She didn't have much dinner more than me to-day."

"To be sure," said the doctor, and he watched with serious interest while Becky prepared a little meal for her pet, and put the plate on the floor. "So you've got a cat, have you," he continued, bending down to examine the grey kitten. "Little Miss Chester offered me a cat the other day."

"That's Master Dennis Chester's sister, ain't it?" asked Becky with sudden interest. "Do you know him too?"

The doctor nodded. "I see them about often," he said. "Nice little girl, and nice little boy."

Becky gave a solemn shake of the head.

"He's more than nice," she said; "he's just splendid. Do you know what he did for father?"

Mr Price did not know; and Becky, strengthened and refreshed by her dinner, sat up eagerly on her sofa and told him the whole story, to which he listened very gravely.

"Well, that's a very good job," he said, as she ended. "We must hope Mr Tuvvy will be able to keep straight. But there's lots of public-houses in Upwell, you know, as well as the Cross Keys at Fieldside, to tempt a man."

"They don't matter near so much," said Becky. "Father don't as a rule want to go out again after he's once home. Not unless," she added, with a little sigh, "it's washing day."

Dr Price gave a slow smile, took out his watch, and jumped to his feet with a suddenness that made Becky start.

"I ought to be seven miles off by this," he said, striding to the door. "Good-bye, Becky."

He seemed to Becky to make one spring from the door to his horse's back, and to gallop furiously up the street the next minute. There were one or two sharp, shrill shrieks from Snip and Snap as they tore after him, and then all was silent.

Dr Price's visits often ended in this abrupt way, but Becky wished he could have stayed a little longer this afternoon, for she was just going to ask him to take a message for her to Master Dennis, and say how very grateful she and Dan felt. However, as that could not be, she comforted herself by making up her mind to ask him next time he came, and settled cosily down to wait for Dan's arrival, when she could tell him all that had passed.



CHAPTER NINE.

PHILIPPA'S VISIT.

"There is no doubt," said Mrs Trevor, "that the air of Fieldside suits dear Philippa; it seems to sooth her nerves."

"I think it does," answered Miss Mervyn.

"And there is no doubt," continued Mrs Trevor, "that the child needs change. She is unusually uncertain in her temper, and Dr Smith advised the sea-side at once. But it would be much easier to send her to my sister's."

"And she would have her cousins to play with," suggested Miss Mervyn.

"I do so wish Katharine had not such odd notions," continued Mrs Trevor discontentedly; "it quite makes me hesitate to let Philippa go there much. Those children are allowed to mix with all sorts of people."

"They are nice little children," Miss Mervyn ventured to say.

"Nice enough at present," said Mrs Trevor, "but who knows how they will grow up? If I were their father—However, you think it would be a good plan to ask my sister to have Philippa for a few days?"

"I certainly do," said Miss Mervyn, with earnest conviction.

Every one at Haughton Park thought so too, for Philippa had been so troublesome lately, that she had made the whole household uncomfortable as well as herself. "The dear child must be ill," Mrs Trevor said, and sent for Dr Smith.

"The old story, my dear madam," he said; "sensitive nerves. I should advise sending your daughter to the sea-side with some young companions. It is important that the system should be braced, and the mind gently amused."

On consideration, Mrs Trevor did not see how she could manage to supply Philippa with sea-air as well as young companions, but it occurred to her that the air of Fieldside might do as well, and to this Miss Mervyn had heartily agreed. So a letter was at once written to Miss Chester, and the subject gently broken to Philippa, who, greatly to every one's surprise and relief, made no difficulty whatever.

"I shall take the kitten with me," she said, rather defiantly, and nothing would have pleased Mrs Trevor better, for Philippa's kitten had become a plague and a worry to every one from morning till night. There were endless complaints about it. It was a thief, it had a bad temper, it scratched the satin chairs in the drawing-room, it climbed up the curtains, it was always in the way. It had broken a whole trayful of wine-glasses. Scarcely a day passed without some fresh piece of mischief. Perhaps the poor kitten could hardly be blamed for all this, for it would have been difficult for a wiser thing than a kitten to understand how to behave under such circumstances. Philippa would pet and spoil it one day, and scold it the next, so that it never quite knew when it was doing right or wrong. There was no doubt, however, that since its arrival there was less peace and quietness than ever at Haughton Park.

Meanwhile at Fieldside the idea of Philippa's visit was received with something like dismay. She had never stayed more than one day before, and there was a good deal of doubt in the children's minds as to whether she would make herself agreeable. Dennis in particular felt this strongly.

"Will Philippa stay two days or three days, Aunt Katharine?" he asked when he heard the news. "When Aunt Trevor says two or three days, does she count the one she comes and the one she goes, because that only leaves one clear day?"

"Oh, I daresay if you're happy together," answered Miss Chester, "her mother will like her to stay longer than that."

It was breakfast time, and she was reading a pile of letters which had just arrived, so that she did not pay much attention to the children. Dennis turned to Maisie and said softly: "I think one clear day's quite long enough; don't you?"

Maisie took some thoughtful spoonfuls of porridge before she answered.

"I'm not quite sure. Sometimes the longer she stays the nicer she gets."

"But, anyhow," objected Dennis, "I don't like her while she's getting nice, so I think it's best for her to go away soon."

Maisie was not quite so sure of this as her brother, though she too felt grave doubts about Philippa's behaviour. If she were in a nice mood, her visit might be pleasant, for there were plenty of things to show her at Fieldside, and plenty to do, if she would only be interested in them, and not have her "grown-up" manner.

"I wonder what she'll say to Darkie," she said, as she sat thinking of this after breakfast.

"She'll say Blanche is much prettier," answered Dennis; "she always says her things are nicer than ours."

"She hasn't seen him beg yet," said Maisie.

It was not long before Philippa had this opportunity, for when she was sitting at tea with her cousins that evening, she happened to look down at her side, and there was Darkie begging. He was the oddest little black figure possible, bolt upright, his bushy tail spread out at the back like a fan, and his paws neatly drooped in front.

"Oh!" she exclaimed, laughing; "how lovely! What a clever cat!"

"He always does it," said Dennis, with quiet pride. "We taught him."

"I told you he begged," added Maisie. "Why don't you teach Blanche?"

"I don't believe she could learn," said Philippa. "She's quite a nuisance at meal times. She stands up and claws and mews until she is fed. She doesn't give any peace."

Maisie looked shocked.

"That's not at all well-behaved," she said. "You oughtn't to let her do that."

"I can't help it," answered Philippa. "I often box her ears, but it's no good. She's a greedy cat, I think. Not so nice as this one, and after all, black is a better colour than white, and Darkie has a bushy tail."

Dennis looked triumphant, but Maisie was sorry to think that the white kitten was not turning out well; and though she had never liked it as much as the others, she felt it was not entirely its own fault. Philippa evidently did not know how to manage cats. She was now on the point of giving Darkie a large corner of buttered toast, when Dennis interfered.

"You mustn't do that, please," he said firmly. "Darkie's never fed at meals. He has his tea afterwards in his own dish."

"Well!" said Philippa, looking very much surprised, "I do call that cruel. You don't mean to say you let him sit up like that for nothing! Blanche wouldn't bear that. If we don't give her what she wants at once, she cries so loud that we're obliged to."

"She's learned that of you, I suppose, hasn't she?" said Dennis.

He spoke without any intention of offending his cousin, and did not mean to be rude; but Philippa drew herself up, and flushed a pale pink all over her face.

"You're a rude boy," she said. Then after a pause, she gave a little nod at him, and added, "Mother says you've just the air of a little Hodge the ploughboy. So there!"

But this arrow did not hit the mark, though Philippa had aimed it as straight as she could. Dennis did not mind being called a ploughboy a bit. He had seen lots of them, and considered theirs an agreeable and interesting occupation; so he only shrugged his shoulders, and left her to recover her temper as she could.

It never answered to be cross at Fieldside, and Philippa had found this out before. There was nothing gained by it. Maisie only looked surprised and sorry, Dennis took no notice at all, and Aunt Katharine was much too busy to spend any time in settling disputes. This being the case, it was surprising to see how soon Philippa got over her passionate fits, and was ready to behave as though nothing had happened.

It was so now, for though she was rather sulky with Dennis all the evening, she got up in quite a good temper the next morning, and did not seem to remember that he had been rude. The three children started off for a walk together soon after breakfast, for Aunt Katharine wanted a message taken to the Manor Farm. On the way, Dennis and Maisie had much to tell about Mr and Mrs Solace, their house, and all their animals; and Philippa listened with interest, though she thought it all rather "odd." This word was indeed constantly on her lips, for her cousins seemed to live in such a very different way from anything she was used to at home. When they passed through the village, nodding and smiling to nearly every one they met, and making little friendly remarks to the people at their cottage doors, she could not help thinking of her stiff walk in the park with Miss Mervyn, which always lasted a certain time if it was fine, and from which she often came back feeling very cross. If the walk at Fieldside were "odd," it was certainly amusing, and she began to wish there were a village at Haughton.

Presently the village ended, and now there was a long narrow lane to go through before the Manor Farm was reached.

"What a nice stick you've got," said Philippa to Dennis.

"It is a jolly stick, isn't it?" he said, holding it out for her to see more closely.

It had all manner of quaint knots on the stem, and the large knob at the top was carved into a very excellent likeness of the little rough dog Peter. Philippa looked at it with admiration.

"I should like one like that," she said. "Where could I buy one?"

"You couldn't buy one at all," said Dennis proudly; "it was made for me. Tuvvy made it."

"Who's Tuvvy?" inquired Philippa.

"A friend of mine," said Dennis; "he's Mr Solace's wheelwright."

"Oh yes, I remember," said Philippa; "Maisie told me about him. What odd friends you have!"

She looked curiously at Dennis as he marched along flourishing his stick. It must be rather nice, she began to think, to do things for people, and for them to be so grateful, and carve sticks on purpose for you.

Still, it was "odd," and there was a good deal in it that she did not understand.

Arrived at the farm, however, her thoughts were soon distracted; first by the appearance of the turkey-cock, and the agreeable discovery that she was not afraid of him.

"What a baby you are, Maisie!" she exclaimed.

"She isn't always," said Dennis; "there are lots of things worse than the turkey-cock that she doesn't mind a bit. Things you'd be afraid of, perhaps.—There is Mrs Solace at the door."

Mrs Solace beamed at the children in her usual kindly way; and, as was her custom, would not think of their leaving the house without eating something after their walk. At home Philippa would have despised bread and honey and new milk, but here somehow it tasted very good, and she was too hungry to stop to call it odd.

"The little lady wants some of your roses, Miss Maisie," said Mrs Solace, looking at the children as they sat side by side; "she's as white as a sloe-blossom."

"My complexion's naturally delicate, thank you," said Philippa, rather offended; "I never get sunburnt like Maisie."

"Oh, well, maybe you've outgrown your strength a bit, my dear," said the farmer's wife, smiling comfortably.—"And now, Master Dennis, I mustn't forget that Andrew's got a couple of young jackdaws for you: would you like to take them back now, or let 'em bide here a little?"

There was some consultation between Dennis and his sister, before it was finally settled that the jackdaws should not be taken then and there to Fieldside, but should first have a home prepared for them.

"And I know just where to build it," he said, as the three children started on their return after saying good-bye to Mrs Solace. "Just in that corner, you know, between the fowl-house and the cow-shed."

"Do you know how to build it?" asked Philippa.

"Well, perhaps not just quite exactly," said Dennis with candour; "but Tuvvy will tell me and help with the difficult parts. He passes through our field every night, you know."

"And shall you work at it just like a carpenter?" asked Philippa with surprise.

"As like as I can," said Dennis modestly; "you see, I do know a little carpentering because I've watched Tuvvy so much."

"You're a very odd boy," said Philippa. Every day that she passed at Fieldside she became more and more certain that her cousins did strange things, and liked strange things; but, at the same time, there was something pleasant about the life they led, and she did not feel cross nearly as often as she did at home. She even began to share their interest in the affairs of the village.

"I wish there were people at Haughton I could go and see like this," she said one day.

"But there isn't any village at Haughton," said Dennis. "There's only the Upwell Road outside the gates."

"There are lots of poor people in Upwell, though," said Philippa.

"That's quite different," said Dennis; "Upwell's a town. I don't suppose Aunt Katharine would let Maisie and me go about alone there as we do here."

For the rest of Philippa's visit she and Maisie were left a good deal to each other's society, for Dennis was now entirely occupied with the building of the jackdaws' house under Tuvvy's advice and direction. One afternoon the two little girls were sitting together in the play-room, threading beads on horsehair to make a collar for Darkie.

"What made Dennis want to help Tuvvy?" asked Philippa suddenly. "Was it after he had carved that stick for him?"

"Why, no; of course not," said Maisie. "Tuvvy did that because he was so much obliged to Dennis."

"Well, then," repeated Philippa, "why did Dennis take all that trouble for him?"

"He liked him," said Maisie; "and when you like people, you want to please them, I suppose."

"I don't think I do," said Philippa slowly; "I want them to please me."

"But that isn't fair," said Maisie. "You ought to please them if they please you; even Darkie knows that. Aunt Katharine says," she added, "that you ought to try to help people and be kind to them, whether they're kind to you or not."

Philippa shrugged her shoulders and seemed to have had enough of that subject, but although she was silent she thought it over in her mind. Maisie, meanwhile, was occupied with a very usual matter—the grey kitten's fate. She was never tired of wondering where it was, who had found it, or whether it was alive at all, and as she had no news of it, the subject was likely to last a long time.

"We shall never be able to see now which of the three is the greatest comfort," she said aloud, "because I don't suppose we shall ever see the grey kitten again."

"Darkie's the best," said Philippa; "he's so clever, and so handsome too."

"Don't you like Blanche?" asked Maisie, dropping her work and looking earnestly at her cousin.

"Sometimes," said Philippa airily, "but she isn't a comfort. Miss Mervyn says she's a plague, and mother would send her away directly if she wasn't mine. If she was as nice and well-behaved as Darkie, we should all love her."

"But," said Maisie, "Darkie is naughty by nature. He really is. We've had a great deal of trouble to make him obedient and good. He was a much worse little kitten than Blanche ever was."

"Well," said Philippa, "I'm quite sure no one could have had more advantages than Blanche. She's had everything she wants, and been allowed to do just as she likes."

"Then," said Maisie solemnly, "I expect you've spoilt her, and that's why she's so troublesome and naughty."

"Perhaps I have and perhaps I haven't," said Philippa recklessly; "I'm tired of threading beads. Let's go out and see how Dennis is getting on."

On the whole, in spite of some sulky moods and one or two fits of temper, Philippa's visit passed off extremely well, and Maisie was quite sorry when the time came to say good-bye. She and Dennis watched the carriage drive away, and waved their hands to her as long as it was in sight.

"She's been quite nice nearly all the while," said Maisie; "I wish she had stopped longer."

She spoke sincerely, for just now Dennis was so absorbed in his jackdaws' house that she felt she should miss Philippa and be rather dull.

"Can't I help you?" she asked, as she followed him to the corner where the jackdaws' house was being put up. It was not much to look at yet, but there were some upright posts, and a roll of wire netting, and some thin lathes of wood and a good deal of sawdust about, so that it had a business air.

"Well, you see," said Dennis, "girls always hurt their fingers with tools, but perhaps you shall try to-morrow. It's too late now. Doesn't it seem a waste, when you're doing something you like, to go to bed and sleep all night?"

"But if you didn't," said Maisie, "you couldn't go on with it, because it's all dark."

"I don't know that," said Dennis; "Tuvvy says it's light all night part of the summer.—There's the tea-bell; we must go in."

"I shouldn't like to be out in the night," said Maisie, with a little shiver, as the children ran towards the house, "when everything's in bed, and it's all so quiet and still."

"Everything isn't in bed," said Dennis. "There's owls, and glow-worms, and bats, and—"

"But they're none of them very nice things to be with," said Maisie hesitatingly; "and then there are bad people out at night, who get into houses and steal things, as they did at Upwell, don't you remember?"

"Oh, you mean thieves," said Dennis; "but as far as they go, it's better to be out of doors than in the house. The policemen are out all night as well as the thieves, so it wouldn't matter a bit."

"Well, you won't forget," said Maisie, quitting the subject of thieves, which was an unpleasant one to her, "that to-morrow morning I'm to help you with the jackdaws' house."

Dennis did not forget, and the following day Maisie was supplied with a hammer, and began her work with great zeal, but alas! two minutes had not passed before the heavy hammer came crashing down on her chubby fingers instead of on the nail she was holding. It was a dreadful moment, not only because of the pain, which was severe, but because she felt that it stamped her inferiority as a girl for ever. She looked piteously up at Dennis with her fingers in her mouth, and her eyes full of tears.

"There!" he began tauntingly, but seeing Maisie's round face quiver with pain, he stopped, threw down his tools, and knelt beside her on the grass.

"Does it hurt much?" he said. "Come in to Aunt Katharine."

Maisie suffered him to lead her into the house without saying a word, for she wanted all her strength to keep from sobbing. The poor fingers were bathed and bound up, and after she had been kissed and comforted, Aunt Katharine said that on the whole she thought Maisie had better not use hammer and nails again. Maisie thought so too just then, but presently, when the pain went off, she began to feel sorry that she was not to help with the jackdaws' house any more. Certainly, as Aunt Katharine pointed out, she could watch Dennis at his work and give advice; but as he never by any chance took any one's advice but Tuvvy's, that would not be very amusing.

"You can hand me the nails, you know," said Dennis, as she sat with a sorrowful face on Aunt Katharine's knee, "and after the jackdaws are in, you can always help to feed them." And with this she was obliged to console herself.



CHAPTER TEN.

ONE WHITE PAW.

The jackdaws' house got on slowly, and this was not surprising, as Dennis had a way of pulling his work to pieces and doing it all over again. Maisie grew impatient sometimes, for at this rate she thought the jackdaws would not be settled in their home until summer was over.

"Hadn't you better let Tuvvy finish it off?" she said one day, when Dennis had spent a full hour in trying to fix a perch to his satisfaction; "it wouldn't take a real carpenter more than half an hour."

Dennis made no answer at first to this taunt. Maisie was only a girl, who did not understand, so it did not matter what she said. Whistling softly, he tried all manner of different positions for the perch, but none pleased him. After all, it would certainly be necessary to have Tuvvy's advice, but that was quite another matter to letting him do the work.

"I shall have to go and see Tuvvy," he said, carelessly throwing down the piece of wood he held; "perhaps Aunt Katharine will let you go too. You could stop at old Sally's, if you didn't want to go into the barn."

As it happened, Aunt Katharine wanted to send a pudding to old Sally, who had been ill, and she gladly gave Maisie leave to go with Dennis, so Peter in attendance, and the pudding in a basket, the children set out the next morning directly after their lessons.

Maisie was pleased to make this visit, and it was such a very bright fresh June morning, that everything out of doors seemed to be as happy as herself as she danced along, with Peter jumping and barking at her side. The sky was as bright blue as the speedwell in the hedges; the leaves on the trees, not old enough yet to be dark and heavy, fluttered gaily in the wind, and made a light green shimmer everywhere. The fields were still dressed in yellow and white, for none of the farmers had cut their grass, and in the woods the deep purple hyacinths still lingered, though these were nearly over. It looked a very happy, bright, flowery world, with everything in it fresh and new, and nothing old or sad to think about.

Maisie had not much to trouble her either that morning, but there was one little sad thought which would come creeping out of a corner in her mind sometimes, and that was the fate of the grey kitten. She wondered now, as she checked her pace to a walk, and rebuked Peter for snuffing at the pudding, whether old Sally might have heard something about it from Eliza. There was always a faint hope of this, but it grew fainter with each visit, and Dennis thought it quite silly to put the question at all. Nevertheless Maisie made up her mind, with a quiet little nod to herself, that she would not forget to ask to-day.

Sally and Anne were talking so very loud inside the cottage, that it was a long while before the children could make themselves heard, and it was not until Dennis had battered on the door with his stick that it was slowly opened.

"Lawk, mother!" cried Anne, "it's the young lady and gentleman from Fieldside.—Come in, dearies, and sit ye down."

Old Sally was sitting in the chimney corner wrapped in a shawl, her brown old face looking a shade paler than usual. Anne set chairs for the visitors next to her, and drew closely up herself on the other side of them, prepared to join in the conversation as much as allowed by her mother, who was a great talker, and always took the lead. The two old lilac sun-bonnets nodded one on each side of the children, as old Sally began plaintively:

"Yes, I've lost my appetite. I don't seem as if I could fancy nothing just lately. I'm tired of the food—it's taters, taters, taters, till I'm fair sick on 'em. Seems as if I could have a bit of summat green, it'd go down better. There was a gal brought me a mite of turnip tops t'other day. 'Twarn't on'y a morsel, so as I could hardly find it in the pot when it was biled, but it give a relish, like."

"Aunt Katharine's sent you a pudding," shouted Maisie, taking it out of the basket.

"And sech a cough as I've had," put in Anne, seizing the opportunity to speak, while her mother warmed the end of her trumpet at the fire; "I expect it's a sharp touch of influenzy."

"I seem to get weaker every day," resumed old Sally, presenting her trumpet for Maisie's use. "I crawled down to the gate, and couldn't hardly get back this morning."

"Why don't you have the doctor?" asked Maisie.

Sally shook her head.

"I've never taken no doctor's stuff in all my days," she said. "Anne there, she's had a deal, poor child; but 'twouldn't do me no good."

Dennis was beginning to make impatient signs, and Maisie knew he would not stay much longer, so in spite of Anne, who was preparing to speak, she shouted hastily down the trumpet, "Has your daughter Eliza found the kitten?"

It was answered as she expected, by solemn shakes of the head, both from Sally and Anne, in the midst of which the children took their leave.

"Please the Lord to send the rain and make the greens grow," were old Sally's last words. But there did not seem much chance of rain yet, for the sun was still shining splendidly, and as the children entered the shadowy barn, Tuvvy's dark figure was lighted up by a ray which came straight through the little window. Maisie seated herself modestly in the background on a chopping-block, while Dennis asked his questions, for she was rather in awe of Tuvvy, though she liked the barn very much, and found plenty to interest her. High up among the rough rafters over her head there were so many cobwebs hanging about, that it puzzled her to think where all the spiders were who had spun them. There were no spiders now, but there were masses of cobwebs in every nook and corner, some of them waving in the dimness like flimsy grey veils, others spread about in such strange shapes that they almost seemed alive. No doubt bats lived up there, Maisie thought, and she even fancied she could see them clinging to the wall, dusky and shadowy as the cobwebs themselves. She turned her eyes with a little shudder, for she did not like bats, to the floor of the barn, and this was much more cheerful to look at, for it was covered with pretty light yellow shavings all in curls and twists. More continually floated down to join them from Tuvvy's bench, where he was planing a piece of wood for Dennis; they were exactly like the flaxen hair of Maisie's favourite doll. Her serious gaze wandered on to the end of the barn, which was almost filled up by a great machine something like a gigantic grasshopper. It looked terribly strong with its iron limbs, although it was at rest, and she felt half afraid of it, though she had often seen it before. What was it, and why was it there?

She could easily have put this question to Tuvvy, but Maisie seldom asked questions. She had a habit of turning things over in her own little mind, and wrapping fancies round them, until she had quite a collection of strange objects in her small world. She would have missed these very much, if they had been exposed to daylight and turned into facts, and in this she was quite different from Dennis; he always wanted to know the reason why, and to have the meaning of things made quite clear to him.

She was not left long, however, to wonder about the big machine, for Tuvvy, giving a sudden wag of his head towards it, said: "The elevator's my next job, soon as hay harvest's over. Wants a lick o' paint."

"How jolly!" exclaimed Dennis, turning towards it with admiration and envy. "I say, won't it just take a lot of paint! What a jolly job!"

"I wish you had it then, master," said Tuvvy grimly. "'Tain't the sort as pleases me. It don't give you no credit when it's done, and the paint splashes you awful. It's what I call a reg'lar comical sort of a job."

"I should like it," said Dennis with deep conviction, still staring at the elevator. "What colour shall you paint it?"

"Gaffer said 'twas to be a sort of a yaller," said Tuvvy; "but it don't make much odds. There, master," he continued, as he finished his planing, "that's what you want, and I'll stop to-morrow as I pass, and give a look at the perches."

Dennis would gladly have stayed much longer to go fully into the painting of the elevator, and other like subjects; but he had been warned not to take up much of Tuvvy's time, so he unwillingly started home with Maisie, clutching his piece of wood under his arm. Until they reached the village, he was so lost in thought that he did not utter a word, but then, coming to a sudden standstill, he exclaimed: "Why shouldn't we paint the jackdaws' house!"

Maisie was struck by the brilliancy of the idea. She stopped too, and gazed at Dennis with admiration.

"It would be splendid," she said. "Do you think Aunt Katharine would let me help?"

"Why, of course," said Dennis; "it's quite a different thing from using tools. Any one can paint!"

"Only the splashes," said Maisie a little doubtfully. "Tuvvy said you got splashed all over. Aunt Katharine mightn't like me to spoil my frocks."

"As to that," said Dennis, "you could wear a big apron. Painters always do. Hulloa! it's raining!"

So it was. The bright sunshine had vanished, and the sky was downcast and grey. First it rained gently, then faster, then it made up its mind in good earnest, and a regular downpour of drops pattered on the hedges, and fell softly on the dusty roads.

"How pleased old Sally will be," said Maisie, "because of the greens!"

"P'r'aps we'd better go in somewhere," said Dennis, looking at his sister's frock; "you're getting awfully wet, and we haven't got an umbrella."

They were just passing Dr Price's lodgings. Snip and Snap, who stood at the gate snuffing up the moist fresh air with their black noses, wagged their stumpy tails in a friendly manner to the children, and growled at Peter at the same time.

"You go in," continued Dennis, hurrying his sister up to the door, "and I'll run home and fetch umbrellas and cloaks for you. Aunt Katharine always says you're not to get wet."

Maisie would much rather have gone on with Dennis, and did not mind the rain a bit; but it was quite true that Aunt Katharine did not like her to get wet. So she yielded, and stood waiting in the little porch for the door to be opened, while Dennis sped up the road, and was soon out of sight.

"Come in, dearie, and welcome," said Mrs Budget, the doctor's landlady, when Maisie had asked for shelter, "and I'll just get a clean cloth and take off the worst of the damp."

She led the way to a very clean kitchen, talking all the while, and flapped vigorously at Maisie's skirt with a towel.

"The doctor's just in, and I says to him, 'Now I do hope, sir, you'll get your meal in comfort to-day, for it's as tidy a little bit of griskin as any one need wish to see, and done to a turn.' Owin' to his profession, he don't give his vittles no chance, the doctor don't. Most times he eats 'em standing, and then up in saddle and off again. It's a hard life, that it is, and he don't even get his nights reg'lar. Snug and warm in bed, and ring goes that bothering night-bell. If it was me, I should turn a deaf ear sometimes, pertickler in the winter.—Is your boots wet, my dear? No; then come in and see the doctor. He'll be pleased."

Maisie would have liked to stay in the kitchen with Mrs Budget, but she was too polite to refuse this invitation, and soon found herself at the door of the doctor's sitting-room.

"Little Miss Chester, sir," said Mrs Budget, "come to shelter from the rain;" and thereupon vanished to dish up the dinner.

Maisie looked curiously round the room. It was small, and smelt strongly of tobacco smoke; chairs, mantelpiece, and floor were untidily littered with old newspapers, books, pipes, and bills scattered about in confusion; a pair of boxing-gloves, which looked to her like the enormous hands of some dead giant, hung on the wall, and on each side of them a bright silver tankard on a bracket.

The doctor himself looming unnaturally large, sat sideways at the table on which a cloth was laid, reading a newspaper. He had his hat on, slightly tilted over one eye, and his booted legs were stretched out before him with an air of relief after fatigue. He jumped up when he saw the shy little figure on the threshold, and took off his hat.

"Come in, come in, Miss Maisie," he said. "Why, this is an honour. Where's your brother?"

"Dennis ran home for umbrellas," said Maisie, placing herself with some difficulty on the high horsehair-chair which he cleared with a sweep of his large hand; "it's raining fast."

"Why, so it is," said her host, glancing out of the window, "and ten minutes ago there was no sign of it. That's a good sight for the farmers. And where have you been? Far?"

"We've been to see Tuvvy," replied Maisie gravely; "he's helping Dennis, you know, with the jackdaws' house."

"Ah, to be sure," said Dr Price readily, though this was the first time he had heard of such a thing. "Tuvvy's a clever fellow, isn't he? And so he's going to stay on at the farm, after all?"

"Dennis did that, you know," said Maisie, forgetting her shyness a little. "Dennis made a Round Robin, and all the men put their names, and so Mr Solace let Tuvvy stop."

The doctor nodded, with a little smile. He seemed to know all about it, and this did not surprise Maisie, who thought it quite natural that such a great event should be widely spread.

"And since then," she went on, encouraged the attentive expression on her listener's face, "he's been as steady as steady! He doesn't have to pass the Cross Keys now, you know, because he goes home over our field, and he thinks it's partly that. It was the red blind drew him in, you see, and then he couldn't come out again."

Dr Price nodded again, and his smile widened in spite of evident efforts to conceal it, as Maisie turned her serious gaze full upon him.

"Just so," he said.

At that very minute it struck Maisie that she had made a dreadful mistake. She ought not to have mentioned red blinds to Dr Price. Dennis had told her he was sometimes "like Tuvvy." She hung her head, and her round cheeks flushed scarlet.