The other two rooms looked upon the garden: one had three windows, and was really a very pleasant parlor.

"This must be our work-room," began Phillis, solemnly, as she stood in the centre of the empty room, looking round her with bright knowing glances. "Oh, what an ugly paper, Nan! but we can easily put up a prettier one. The smaller room must be where we live and take our meals: it is not quite so cheerful as this. It is so nice having this side-window; it will give us more light, and we shall be able to see who comes in at the door."

"Yes, that is an advantage," assented Nan. She was agreeably surprised to find such a good-sized room in the cottage; it was decidedly low, and the windows were not plate-glass, but she thought that on summer mornings they might sit there very comfortably looking out at the lawn and the medlar-tree.

"We shall be glad of these cupboards," she suggested, after a pause, while Phillis, took out sundry pieces of tape from her pocket and commenced making measurements in a business-like manner. "Our work will make such a litter, and I should like things to be as tidy as possible. I am thinking," she continued, "we might have mother's great carved wardrobe in the recess behind the door. It is really a magnificent piece of furniture, and in a work-room it would not be so out of place; we could hang up the finished and unfinished dresses in it out of the dust. And we could have the little drawing-room chiffonnier between the windows for our pieces, and odds and ends in the cupboards. It is a pity our table is round; but perhaps it will look all the more comfortable. The sewing-machine must be in the side-window," added Nan, who was quite in her element now, for she loved all housewifely arrangements; "and mother's easy-chair and little table must stand by the fireplace. My davenport will be useful for papers and accounts."

"It is really a very convenient room," returned Phillis, in a satisfied voice, when they had exhausted its capabilities; and, though the second parlor was small and dull in comparison, even Nan dropped no disparaging word.

Both of them agreed it would do very well. There was a place for the large roomy couch that their mother so much affected, and their favorite chairs and knick-knacks would soon make it look cosey: and after this they went upstairs hand in hand.

There were only four bedrooms, and two of these were not large; the most cheerful one was, of course, allotted to their mother, and the next in size must be for Phillis and Dulce. Nan was to have a small one next to her mother.

The evening was drawing on by the time they had finished their measurements and left the cottage. Nan, who was tired and wanted her tea, was for hurrying on to Beach House; but Phillis insisted on calling at the Library. She wanted to put some questions to Miss Milner. To-morrow they would have the paper-hanger, and look out for a gardener, and there was Mrs. Crump to interview about cleaning down the cottage.

"Oh, very well," returned Nan, wearily, and she followed Phillis into the shop, where good-natured bustling Miss Milner came to them at once.

Phillis put the question to her in a low voice, for there were other customers exchanging books over the counter. The same young clergyman they had before noticed had just bought a local paper, and was waiting evidently for a young lady who was turning over some magazines quite close to them.

"Do we know of a good dressmaker in the place?" repeated Miss Milner, in her loud cheerful voice, very much to Nan's discomfort, for the clergyman looked up from his paper at once. "Miss Monks was a tolerable fit, but, poor thing! she died a few weeks ago; and Mrs. Slasher, who lives over Viner's the haberdasher's, cannot hold a candle to her. Miss Masham there,"—pointing to a smart ringleted young person, evidently her assistant,—"had her gown ruined by her: hadn't you, Miss Masham?"

Miss Masham simpered, but her reply was inaudible; but the young lady who was standing near them suddenly turned round:

"There is Mrs. Langley, who lives just by. I shall be very happy to give these ladies her address, for she is a widow with little children, and I am anxious to procure her work—" and then she looked at Nan, and hesitated; "that is, if you are not very particular," she added, with sudden embarrassment, for even in her morning dress there was a certain style about Nan that distinguished her from other people.

"Thank you, Miss Drummond," returned Miss Milner, gratefully. "Shall I write down the address for you, ma'am?"

"Yes,—no,—thank you very much, but perhaps it does not matter," returned Nan, hurriedly, feeling awkward for the first time in her life. But Phillis, who realized all the humor of the situation, interposed:

"The address will do us no harm, and we may as well have it, although we should not trouble Mrs. Langley. I will call in again, Miss Milner, to-morrow morning, and then I will explain what it is we really want. We are in a hurry now," continued Phillis, loftily, turning away with a dignified inclination of her head toward the officious stranger.

Phillis was not prepossessed in her favor. She was a dark, wiry little person, not exactly plain, but with an odd, comical face; and she was dressed so dowdily and with such utter disregard of taste that Phillis instinctively felt Mrs. Langley was not to be dreaded.

"What a queer little body! Do you think she belongs to him?" she asked Nan, as they walked rapidly toward Beach House.

"What in the world made you strike in after that fashion?" demanded the young man, as he and his companion followed more slowly in the strangers' footsteps. "That is just your way, Mattie, interfering and meddling in other folks' affairs. Why cannot you mind your own business sometimes," he continued, irritably, "instead of putting your foot into other people's?"

"You are as cross as two sticks this afternoon, Archie," returned his sister, composedly. She had a sharp little pecking voice that seemed to match her, somehow; for she was not unlike a bright-eyed bird, and had quick pouncing movements. "Wait a moment: my braid has got torn, and is dragging."

"I wish you would think a little more of my position, and take greater pains with your appearance," returned her brother, in an annoyed voice. "What would Grace say to see what a fright you make of yourself? It is a sin and a shame for a woman to be untidy or careless in her dress; it is unfeminine! it is unlady-like!" hurling each separate epithet at her.

Perhaps Miss Drummond was used to these compliments, for she merely pinned her braid without seeming the least put out.

"I think I am a little shabby," she remarked, tranquilly, as they at last walked on. "Perhaps Mrs. Langley had better make me a dress too," with a laugh, for, in spite of her sharp voice, she was an even-tempered little body; but this last remark only added fuel to his wrath.

"You really have less sense than a child. The idea of recommending a person like Mrs. Langley to those young ladies,—a woman who works for Miss Masham!"

"They were very plainly dressed, Archie," returned poor Mattie, who felt this last snub acutely; for, if there was one thing upon which she prided herself, it was her good sense. "They had dark print dresses,—not as good as the one I have on,—and nothing could be quieter."

"Oh, you absurd little goose!" exclaimed her brother, and he burst into a laugh, for the drollery of the comparison restored him to instant good humor. "If you cannot see the difference between that frumpish gown of yours, with its little bobtails and fringes, and those pretty dresses before us, I must say you are as blind as a bat, Mattie."

"Oh, never mind my gown," returned Mattie, with a sigh.

She had had these home-thrusts to meet and parry nearly every day, ever since she had come to keep house for this fastidious brother. She was a very active, bustling little person, who had done a great deal of tough work in her day, but she never could be made to see that unless a woman add the graces of life to the cardinal virtues she is, comparatively speaking, a failure in the eyes of the other sex.

So, though Mattie was a frugal housekeeper, and worked from morning to night in his service,—the veriest little drudge that was ever seen,—she was a perpetual eyesore to her brother, who loved feminine grace and repose,—whose tastes were fastidious and somewhat arbitrary. And so it was poor Mattie had more censure than praise, and wrote home piteous letters complaining that nothing she did seemed to satisfy Archie, and that her mother had made a great mistake in sending her, and not Grace, to preside over his bachelor establishment.

"Oh, Phillis, how shall we have courage to publish our plan?" exclaimed Nan, when they were at last discussing the much-needed tea and chops in the little parlor at Beach House.

The window was wide open. The returning tide was coming in with a pleasant ripple and wash over the shingle. The Parade was nearly empty; but some children's voices sounded from the green space before the houses. The brown sail of a fishing craft dipped into the horizon. It was so cool, so quiet, so restful; but Nan's eyes were weary, and she put the question wistfully.

Phillis looked into the teapot to gain a moment's reprieve; the corners of her mouth had an odd pucker in them.

"I never said it was not hard," she burst out at last. "I felt like a fool myself while I was speaking to Miss Milner; but then that clergyman was peeping at us between the folds of his paper. He seemed a nice-looking, gentlemanly sort of man. Do you think that queer little lady in the plaid dress could be his wife? Oh, no; I remember Miss Milner addressed her as Miss Drummond. Then she must be his sister: how odd!"

"Why should it be odd?" remarked Nan, absently, who had not particularly noticed them.

"Oh, she was such a dowdy little thing, not a bit nice-looking, and he was quite handsome, and looked rather distinguished. You know I always take stock of people, and make up my mind about them at once. And then we are to be such close neighbors."

"I don't suppose we shall see much of them," was Nan's somewhat depressed reply; and then, as they had finished their tea they placed themselves at the open window, and began to talk about the business of next day; and, in discussing cupboards and new papers, Nan forgot her fatigue, and grew so interested that it was quite late before they thought of retiring to rest.



CHAPTER XI.

"TELL US ALL ABOUT IT, NAN."

Nan overslept herself, and was rather late the next morning; but as she entered the parlor, with an exclamation of penitence for her tardiness, she found her little speech was addressed to the empty walls. A moment after, a shadow crossed the window, and Phillis came in.

She went up to Nan and kissed her, and there was a gleam of fun in her eyes.

"Oh, you lazy girl!" she said; "leaving me all the hard work to do. Do you know, I have been around to the Library, and have had it all out with Miss Milner; and in the Steyne I met the clergyman again, and—would you believe it; he looked quite disappointed because you were not there!"

"Nonsense!" returned Nan, sharply. She never liked this sort of joking speeches: they seemed treasonable to Dick.

"Oh, but he did," persisted Phillis, who was a little excited and reckless after her morning's work. "He threw me a disparaging glance, which said, as plainly as possible, 'Why are you not the other one?' That comes from having a sister handsomer than one's self."

"Oh, Phillis! when people always think you so nice, and when you are so clever!"

Phillis got up and executed a little courtesy in the prettiest way, and then she sank down upon her chair in pretended exhaustion.

"What I have been through! But I have come out of it alive. Confess, now, there's a dear, that you could not have done it!"

"No; indeed," with an alarmed air. "Do you really mean to say that you actually told Miss Milner what we meant to do?"

"I told her everything. There, sit down and begin your breakfast, Nan, or we shall never be ready. I found her alone in the shop. Thank goodness, that Miss Masham was not there. I have taken a dislike to that simpering young person, and would rather make a dress for Mrs. Squails any day than for her. I told her the truth, without a bit of disguise. Would you believe it, the good creature actually cried about it! she quite upset me too. 'Such young ladies! dear, dear: one does not often see such,' she kept saying over and over again. And then she put out her hand and stroked my dress, and said, 'Such a beautiful fit, too; and to think you have made it yourself! such a clever young lady! Oh, dear! whatever will Mr. Drummond and Miss Mattie say?' Stupid old thing! as though we cared what he said!"

"Oh, Phillis! and she cried over it?"

"She did indeed. I am not exaggerating. Two big round tears rolled down her cheeks. I could have kissed her for them. And then she made me sit down in the little room behind the shop, where she was having her breakfast, and poured me out a cup of tea and——" But here Nan interrupted her, and there was a trace of anxiety in her manner.

"Poured you out a cup of tea! Miss Milner! And you drank it!"

"Of course I drank it; it was very good, and I was thirsty."

But here Nan pounced upon her unexpectedly, and dragged her to the window.

"Your fun is only make-believe: there is no true ring about it. Let me see your eyes. Oh, Phil, Phil! I thought so! You have been crying, too!"

Phillis looked a little taken aback. Nan was too sharp for her. She tried to shake herself free a little pettishly.

"Well, if I choose to make a fool of myself for once in my life, you need not be silly about it; the old thing was so upsetting, and—and it was so hard to get it out." Phillis would not have told for worlds how utterly she had broken down over that task of hers; how the stranger's sympathy had touched so painful a chord that, before she knew what she was doing, she had laid her head down on the counter and was crying like a baby,—all the more that she had so bravely pent up her feelings all these days that she might not dishearten her sisters.

But, as Nan petted and praised her, she did tell how good Miss Milner had been to her.

"Fancy a fat old thing like that having such fine feelings," she said, with an attempt to recover her sprightliness. "She was as good as a mother to me,—made me sit in the easy-chair, and brought me some elder-flower water to bathe my eyes, and tried to cheer me up by saying that we should have plenty of work. She has promised not to tell any one just yet about us; but when we are really in the Friary she will speak to people and recommend us: and—" here Phillis gave a little laugh—"we are to make up a new black silk for her that her brother has just sent her. Oh, dear, what will mother say to us, Nan?" And Phillis looked at her in an alarmed, beseeching way, as though in sore need of comfort.

Nan looked grave; but there was no hesitation in her answer:

"I am afraid it is too late to think of that now, Phil: it has to be done, and we must just go through with it."

"You are right, Nanny darling, we must just go through with it," agreed Phillis; and then they went on with their unfinished breakfast, and after that the business of the day began.

It was late in the evening when they reached home. Dulce who was at the gate looking out for them, nearly smothered them with kisses.

"Oh, you dear things! how glad I am to get you back," she said, holding them both. "Have you really only been away since yesterday morning? It seems a week at least."

"You ridiculous child! as though we believe that! But how is mother?"

"Oh, pretty well: but she will be better now you are back. Do you know," eying them both very gravely, "I think it was a wise thing of you to go away like that? it has shown me that mother and I could not do without you at all: we should have pined away in those lodgings; it has quite reconciled me to the plan," finished Dulce, in a loud whisper that reached her mother's ears.

"What plan? What are you talking about, Dulce? and why do you keep your sisters standing in the hall?" asked Mrs. Challoner, a little irritably. But her brief nervousness vanished at the sight of their faces: she wanted nothing more, she told herself, but to see them round her, and hear their voices.

She grew quite cheerful when Phillis told her about the new papers, and how Mrs. Crump was to clean down the cottage, and how Crump had promised to mow the grass and paint the greenhouse, and Jack and Bobbie were to weed the garden-paths.

"It is a perfect wilderness now, mother: you never saw such a place."

"Never mind, so that it will hold us, and that we shall all be together," she returned, with a smile. "But Dulce talked of some plan: you must let me hear it, my dears; you must not keep me in the dark about anything. I know we shall all have to work," continued the poor lady; "but if we be all together, if you will promise not to leave me, I think I could bear anything."

"Are we to tell her!" motioned Nan with her lips to Phillis; and as Phillis nodded, "Yes," Nan gently and quietly began unfolding their plan.

But, with all her care and all Phillis's promptings, the revelation was a great shock to Mrs. Challoner; in her weakened state she seemed hardly able to bear it.

Dulce repented bitterly her incautious whisper when she saw her sisters' tired faces, and their fruitless attempts to soften the effects of such a blow. For a little while, Mrs. Challoner seemed on the brink of despair; she would not listen; she abandoned herself to lamentations; she became so hysterical at last that Dorothy was summoned from the kitchen and taken into confidence.

"Mother, you are breaking our hearts," Nan said, at last. She was kneeling at her feet, chafing her hands, and Phillis was fanning her; but she pushed them both away from her with weak violence.

"It is I whose heart is breaking! Why must I live to see such things? Dorothy, do you know my daughters are going to be dressmakers?—my daughters, who are Challoners,—who have been delicately nurtured,—who might hold up their heads with any one?"

"Dorothy, hold your tongue!" exclaimed Phillis, peremptorily. "You are not to speak; this is for us to decide, and no one else. Mammy, you are making Nan look quite pale: she is dreadfully tired, and so am I. Why need we decide anything to-night? Every one is upset and excited, and when that is the case one can never arrive at any proper conclusion. Let us talk about it to-morrow, when we are rested." And, though Mrs. Challoner would not allow herself to be comforted, Nan's fatigue and paleness were so visible to her maternal eyes that they were more eloquent than Phillis's words.

"I must not think only of myself. Yes, yes, I will do as you wish. There will be time enough for this sort of talk to-morrow. Dorothy, will you help me? The young ladies are tired; they have had a long journey. No, my dear, no," as Dulce pressed forward; "I would rather have Dorothy." And, as the old servant gave them a warning glance, they were obliged to let her have her way.

"Mammy has never been like this before," pouted Dulce, when they were left alone. "She drives us away from her as though we had done something purposely to vex her."

"It is because she cannot bear the sight of us to-night," returned Phillis, solemnly. "It is worse for her than for us; a mother feels things for her children more than for herself; it is nature, that is what it is," she finished philosophically; "but she will be better to-morrow." And after this the miserable little conclave broke up.

Mrs. Challoner passed a sleepless night, and her pillow was sown with thorns. To think of the Challoners falling so low as this! To think of her pretty Nan, her clever, bright Phillis, her pet Dulce coming to this; "oh, the pity of it!" she cried in the dark hours, when vitality runs lowest, and thoughts seem to flow involuntarily towards a dark centre.

But with the morning came sunshine, and her girl's faces,—a little graver than usual, perhaps, but still full of youth and the brightness of energy; and the sluggish nightmare of yesterday's grief began to fade a little.

"Now, mammy, you are not going to be naughty to-day!" was Dulce's morning salutation as she seated herself on the bed.

Mrs. Challoner smiled faintly:

"Was I very naughty last night, Dulce?"

"Oh, as bad as possible. You pushed poor Nan and Phillis away, and would not let any one come near you but that cross old Dorothy, and you never bade us good-night; but if you promise to be good, I will forgive you and make it up," finished Dulce, with those light butterfly kisses to which she was addicted.

"Now, Chatterbox, it is my turn," interrupted Phillis; and then she began a carefully concocted little speech, very carefully drawn out to suit her mother's sensitive peculiarities.

She went over the old ground patiently point by point. Mrs. Challoner shuddered at the idea of letting lodgings.

"I knew you would agree with us," returned Phillis, with a convincing nod; and then she went on to the next clause.

Mrs. Challoner argued a great deal about the governess scheme. She was quite angry with Phillis, and seemed to suffer a great deal of self-reproach, when the girl spoke of their defective education and lack of accomplishments. Nan had to come to her sister's rescue; but the mother was slow to yield the point:

"I don't know what you mean. My girls are not different from other girls. What would your poor father say if he were alive? It is cruel to say this to me, when I stinted myself to give you every possible advantage, and I paid Miss Martin eighty pounds a year," she concluded, tearfully, feeling as though she were the victim of a fraud.

She was far more easily convinced that going out as companions would be impracticable under the circumstances. "Oh, no, that will never do!" she cried, when the two little rooms with Dulce were proposed; and after this Phillis found her task less difficult. She talked her mother over at last to reluctant acquiescence. "I never knew how I came to consent," she said, afterwards, "but they were too much for me."

"We cannot starve. I suppose I must give in to you," she said, at last; "but I shall never hold up my head again." And she really believed what she said.

"Mother, you must trust us," replied Phillis, touched by this victory she had won. "Do you know what I said to Dulce? Work cannot degrade us. Though we are dressmakers, we are still Challoners. Nothing can make us lose our dignity and self-respect as gentlewomen."

"Other people will not recognize it," returned her mother, with a sigh. "You will lose caste. No one will visit you. Among your equals you will be treated as inferiors. It is this that bows me to the earth with shame."

"Mother, how can you talk so?" cried Nan, in a clear, indignant voice. "What does it matter if people do not visit us? We must have a world of our own, and be sufficient for ourselves, if we can only keep together. Is not that what you have said to us over and over again? Well, we shall be together, we shall have each other. What does the outside world matter to us after all?"

"Oh, you are young; you do not know what complications may arise," replied Mrs. Challoner, with the gloomy forethought of middle age. She thought she knew the world better than they, but in reality she was almost as guileless and ignorant as her daughters. "Until you begin, you do not know the difficulties that will beset you," she went on.

But notwithstanding this foreboding speech, she was some what comforted by Nan's words: "they would be together!" Well, if Providence chose to inflict this humiliation and afflictive dispensation on her, it could be borne as long as she had her children around her.

Nan made one more speech,—a somewhat stern one for her.

"Our trouble will be a furnace to try our friends. We shall know the true from the false. Only those who are really worth the name will be faithful to us."

Nan was thinking of Dick; but her mother misunderstood her, and grew alarmed.

"You will not tell the Paines and the other people about here what you intend to do, surely? I could not bear that! no, indeed, I could not bear that!"

"Do not be afraid, dear mother," returned Nan, sadly, "we are far too great cowards to do such a thing, and, after all, there is no need to put ourselves to needless pain. If the Maynes were here we might not be able to keep it from them, perhaps, and so I am thankful they are away."

Nan said this quite calmly, though her mother fixed her eyes upon her in a most tenderly mournful fashion. She had quite forgotten their Longmead neighbors, but now, as Nan recalled them to her mind, she remembered Mr. Mayne, and her look had become compassionate.

"It will be all over with those poor children," she thought to herself: "the father will never allow it,—never; and I cannot wonder at him." And then her heart softened to the memory of Dick, whom she had never thought good enough for Nan, for she remembered now with a sore pang that her pride was laid low in the dust, and that she could not hope now that her daughters would make splendid matches: even Dick would be above them, though his father had been in trade, and though he had no grandfather worth mentioning.

A few days after their return from Hadleigh, there was an other long business interview with Mr. Trinder, in which every thing was settled. A tenant had already been found for the cottage. A young couple, on the eve of their marriage, who had long been looking for a suitable house in the neighborhood had closed at once with Mr. Trinder's offer, and had taken the lease off their hands. The gentleman was a cousin of the Paines and, partly for the convenience of the in-coming tenants, and partly because the Challoners wished to move as soon as possible, there was only a delay of a few weeks before the actual flitting.

It would be impossible to describe the dismay of the neighborhood when the news was circulated.

Immediately after their return from Hadleigh, Nan and Phillis took counsel together, and, summoning up their courage, went from one to another of their friends and quietly announced their approaching departure.

"Mother has had losses, and we are now dreadfully poor, and we are going to leave Glen Cottage and go down to a small house we have at Hadleigh," said Nan, who by virtue of an additional year of age was spokeswoman on this occasion. She had fully rehearsed this little speech, which she intended to say at every house in due rotation. "We will not disguise the truth; we will let people know that we are poor, and then they will not expect impossibilities," she said, as they walked down the shady roads towards the Paines' house,—for the Paines were their most intimate friends and had a claim to the first confidence.

"I think that will be sufficient; no one has any right to know more," she continued, decidedly, fully determined that no amount of coaxing and cross-examination should wring from her one unnecessary word.

But she little knew how difficult it would be to keep their own counsel. The Paines were not alone: they very seldom were. Adelaide Sartoris was there, and the younger Miss Twentyman, and a young widow, a Mrs. Forbes, who was a distant connection of Mrs. Paine.

Nan was convinced that they had all been talking about them, for there was rather an embarrassed pause as she and Phillis entered the room. Carrie looked a little confused as she greeted them.

Nan sat down by Mrs. Paine, who was rather deaf, and in due time made her little speech. She was rather pale with the effort, and her voice faltered a little, but every word was heard at the other end of the room.

"Leave Glen Cottage, my dear? I can't have heard you rightly. I am very deaf, to-day,—very. I think I must have caught cold." And Mrs. Paine turned a mild face of perplexity on Nan; but, before she could reiterate her words, Carrie was on the footstool at her feet, and Miss Sartoris, with a grave look of concern on her handsome features, was standing beside her:

"Oh, Nan! tell us all about it! Of course we saw something was the matter. Dulce was so strange that afternoon; and you have all been keeping yourselves invisible for ever so long."

"There is very little to tell," returned Nan, trying to speak cheerfully. "Mother has had bad news. Mr. Gardiner is bankrupt, and all our invested money is gone. Of course we could not go on living at Glen Cottage. There is some talk, Carrie, of your cousin, Mr. Ibbetson, coming to look at it: it will be nice for us if he could take the lease off our hands, and then we should go down to the Friary."

"How I shall hate to see Ralph there!—not but what it will suit him and Louisa well enough, I dare say. But never mind him: I want to know all about yourselves," continued Carrie, affectionately. "This is dreadful, Nan! I can hardly believe it. What are we to do without you? and where is the Friary? and what is it like? and what will you do with yourselves when you get there?"

"Yes, indeed, that is what we want to know," agreed Miss Sartoris, putting her delicately-gloved hand on Nan's shoulder; and then Sophy Paine joined the little group, and Mrs. Forbes and Miss Twentyman left off talking to Phillis, and began listening; with all their might. Now it was that Nan began to foresee difficulties.

"The Friary is very small," she went on, "but it will just hold us and Dorothy. Dorothy is coming with us, of course. She is old, but she works better than some of the young ones. She is a faithful creature——"

But Carrie interrupted her impatiently:

"But, Nan, what will you do with yourselves? Hadleigh is a nice place, I believe. Mamma, we must all go down there next summer, and stay there,—you shall come with us, Adelaide,—and then we shall be able to cheer these poor things up; and Nan, you and Phillis must come and stay with us. We don't mean to give you up like this. What does it matter about being poor? We are all old friends together. You shall give us tea at the Friary; and I dare say there are tennis-grounds at Hadleigh, and we will have nice times together."

"Of course we will come and see you," added Miss Sartoris, with a friendly pressure of Nan's shoulder; but the poor girl only colored up and looked embarrassed, and then it was that Phillis, who was watching her opportunity, struck in:

"You are all very good; but, Carrie, I don't believe you understand Nan one bit. When people lose their money they have to work. We shall all have to put our shoulder to the wheel. We would give you tea, of course, but as for paying visits and playing tennis, it is only idle girls like yourselves who have time for that sort of thing. It will be work and not play, I fear, with us."

"Oh, Phillis!" exclaimed poor Carrie, with tears in her eyes, and Miss Sartoris looked horrified, for she had West-Indian blood in her veins and was by nature somewhat indolent and pleasure-loving.

"Do you mean you will have to be governesses?" she asked, with a touch of dismay in her voice.

"We shall have to work," returned Phillis, vaguely. "When we are settled at the Friary we must look round us and do the best we can." This was felt to be vague by the whole party; but Phillis's manner was so bold and well assured that no one suspected that anything lay beyond the margin of her speech. They had not made up their minds, perhaps; Sir Francis Challoner would assist them; or there were other sources of help: they must move into the new house first, and then see what was to be done. It was so plausible, so sensible, that every one was deceived.

"Of course you cannot decide in such a hurry: you must have so much to do just now," observed Carrie. "You must write and tell us all your plans, Phillis, and if there be anything we can do to help you. Mamma, we might have Mrs. Challoner here while the cottage is dismantled. Do spare her to us, Nan, and we will take such care of her!" And they were still discussing this point, and trying to overrule Nan's objections,—who knew nothing would induce her mother to leave them,—when other visitors were announced, and in the confusion they were allowed to make their escape.



CHAPTER XII.

"LADDIE" PUTS IN AN APPEARANCE.

"I think we have managed that as well as possible!" exclaimed Phillis, when they found themselves outside the gates. "What a good thing Adelaide and Mrs. Forbes and Lily were there! Now we need only call at those three houses to say good-bye. How hot you look, Nan! and how they all hemmed you in! I was obliged to come to your rescue, you were so beset; but I think I have put them off the scent."

"Yes, for the present; but think, Phil, if Carrie really carries out her intention, and all the Paine tribe and Adelaide come down to Hadleigh next summer! No wonder I am hot; the bare idea suffocates me."

"Something may turn up before then; it is no good looking so far ahead," was the philosophical rejoinder. "Adelaide is rather formidable, certainly, and, in spite of her good nature, one does not feel at home with her. There is a flavor of money about her, I think; she dresses, talks, and lives in such a gilded way one finds her heavy; but she may get married before then. Mr. Dalrymple certainly seemed to mean it when he was down here last winter, and he will be a good match for her. But here we are at Fitzroy Square. I wonder what sort of humor her ladyship will be in?"

Lady Fitzroy received them very graciously. She had just been indulging in a slight dispute with her husband, and the interruption was welcome to both of them; besides, she was always gracious to the Challoners.

"You have just come in time, for we were boring each other dreadfully," she said, in her pretty languid way, holding out a hand to each of them. "Percival, will you ring the bell, please? I cannot think why Thorpe does not bring up the tea as usual!"

Lord Fitzroy obeyed his wife's behest, and then he turned with a relieved air to his old friend Phillis. She was the clever one; and though some people called her quiet, that was because they did not draw her out, or she had no sympathy with them. He had always found her decidedly amusing and agreeable in the days of his bachelorhood.

He had married the beauty of a season, but the beauty was not without her little crotchets and tempers; and though he was both fond and proud of his wife, he found Phillis's talk a relief this afternoon.

But Phillis was a little distraite on this occasion: she wanted to hear what Nan was saying in a low voice across the room, and Thorpe and his subordinate were setting the tea-table, and Lord Fitzroy would place himself just before her.

"Now look here, Miss Challoner," he was saying, "I want to tell you all about it;" but here Thorpe left the room, and Lady Fitzroy interrupted them:

"Oh, Percival, what a pity! Do you hear?—we are going to lose our nicest neighbors? Dear little Glen Cottage is to be empty in a week or so!"

"Mr. Ralph Ibbetson will decide to take it, I think; and he and Miss Blake are to be married on the 16th of next month," returned Nan, softly.

"Ibbetson at Glen Cottage! that red-headed fellow! My dear Miss Challoner, what sacrilege!—what desecration! What do you mean by forsaking us in this fashion? Are you all going to be married? Has Sir Francis died and left you a fortune? In the name of all that is mysterious, what is the meaning of this?"

"If you will let a person speak, Percival," returned his wife, with dignity, "you shall have an answer:" and then she looked up in his handsome, good-natured face, and her manner softened insensibly. "Poor dear Mrs. Challoner has had losses! Some one has played her false, and they are obliged to leave Glen Cottage. But Hadleigh is a nice place," she went on, turning to Nan: "it is very select."

"Where did you say, Evelyn?" inquired her husband, eagerly. "Hadleigh, in Sussex? Oh, that is a snug little place; no Toms and Harries go down there on a nine hours' trip. I was there myself once, with the Shannontons. Perhaps Lady Fitzroy and I may run down one day and have a look at you," he continued, with a friendly look at Phillis. It was only one of his good-natured speeches, but his wife took umbrage at it.

"The sea never agrees with me. I thought you knew that, Percival!" rather reproachfully; "but I dare say we shall often see you here," she went on, fearing Nan would think her ungracious. "You and the Paines are so intimate that they are sure to have you for weeks together; it is so pleasant revisiting an old neighborhood, is it not? I know I always feel that with regard to Nuneaton."

"Nuneaton never suits my constitution. I thought you would have remembered that, Evelyn," returned her husband, gravely; and then they both laughed. Lord Fitzroy was not without a sense of humor, and often restored amity by a joking word after this fashion, and then the conversation proceeded more smoothly.

Nan and Phillis felt far more at their ease here than they had felt at the Paines'. There were no awkward questions asked: Lady Fitzroy was far too well bred for that. If she wondered at all how the Challoners were to live after they had lost their money, she kept such remarks for her husband's private ear.

"Those girls ought to marry well," observed Lord Fitzroy, when he found himself alone again with his wife. "Miss Challoner is as pretty a creature as one need see, but Miss Phillis has the most in her."

"How are they to meet people if they are going to bury themselves in a little sea-side place?" she returned, regretfully. "Shall I put on my habit now, Percy? do you think it will be cool enough for our ride?"

"Yes, run along, my pet, and don't keep me too long waiting." Nevertheless, Lord Fitzroy did not object when his wife made room for him a moment beside her on the couch, while she made it up to him for her cross speeches, as she told him.

"There, little mother, it is all done!" exclaimed Phillis, in a tone of triumph, as later on in the afternoon they returned to the cottage; but in spite of her bravado, both the girls looked terribly jaded, and Nan especially seemed out of spirits; but then they had been round the Longmead garden, and had gathered some flowers in the conservatory, and this alone would have been depressing work to Nan.

From that time they lived in a perpetual whirl, a bustle of activity that grew greater; and not less, from day to day. Mrs. Challoner had quietly but decidedly refused the Paines' invitation. Nan was right; nothing would have induced her to leave her girls in their trouble: she made light of their discomfort, forgot her invalid airs, and persisted in fatiguing herself to an alarming extent.

"You must let me do things; I should be wretched to sit with my hands before me, and not help you," she said with tears in her eyes, and when they appealed in desperation to Dorothy, she took her mistress's side:

"Working hurts less than worrying. Don't you be fretting about the mistress too much, or watching her too closely. It will do her no harm, take my word for it." And Dorothy was right.

But there was one piece of work that Nan set her mother to do before they left the cottage.

"Mother," she said to her one day when they were alone together. "Mrs. Mayne will be wondering why you do not answer her letter. I think you had better write, and tell her a little about things. We must not put it off any longer, or she will be hurt with us." And Mrs. Challoner very reluctantly set about her unpleasant task.

But, after all, it was Nan who furnished the greater part of the composition. Mrs. Challoner was rather verbose and descriptive in her style. Nan cut down her sentences ruthlessly, and so pruned and simplified the whole epistle that her mother failed to trace her own handiwork: and at the last she added a postscript in her own pretty handwriting.

Mrs. Challoner was rather dissatisfied with the whole thing.

"You have said so little, Nan! Mrs. Mayne will be quite affronted at our reticence."

"What is the use of harrowing people's feelings?" was Nan's response.

It was quite true she had dwelt as little as possible on their troubles.

The few opening sentences had related solely to their friends' affairs.

"You will be sorry to hear," Mrs. Challoner wrote after this, "that I have met with some severe losses. I dare say Mr. Mayne will remember that my poor husband invested our little income in the business of his cousin, Mark Gardiner. We have just heard the unwelcome news that Gardiner & Fowler have failed for a large amount. Under these circumstances, we think it more prudent to leave Glen Cottage as soon as possible, and settle at Hadleigh, where we have a small house belonging to us called the Friary. Fortunately for us, Mr. Trinder has found us a tenant, who will take the remainder of the lease off our hands. Do you remember Mr. Ralph Ibbetson, the Paines' cousin, that rather heavy-looking young man, with reddish hair, who was engaged to that pretty Miss Blake?—well, he has taken Glen Cottage; and I hope you will find them nice neighbors. Tell Dick he must not be too sorry to miss his old friends, but of course you will understand this is a sad break to us. Settling down in a new place is never very pleasant; and as my girls will have to help themselves, and we shall all have to learn to do without things, it will be somewhat of a discipline to us; but as long as we are together, we all feel, such difficulties can be easily borne.

"Tell Mr. Mayne that, if I had foreseen how things were to turn out, I would have conquered my indisposition, and not have forfeited my last evening at Longmead."

And in the postscript Nan wrote hurriedly,—

"You must not be too sorry for us, dear Mrs. Mayne, for mother is as brave as possible, and we are all determined to make the best of things.

"Of course it is very sad leaving dear Glen Cottage, where we have spent such happy, happy days; but, though the Friary is small, we shall make it very comfortable. Tell Dick the garden is a perfect wilderness at present, and that there are no roses,—only a splendid passion-flower that covers the whole back of the house."

Nan never knew why she wrote this. Was it to remind him vaguely that the time of roses was over, and that from this day things would be different with them?

Nan was quite satisfied when she had despatched this letter. It told just enough, and not too much. It sorely perplexed and troubled Dick; and yet neither he nor his father had the least idea how things really were with the Challoners.

"Didn't I tell you so, Bessie?" exclaimed Mr. Mayne, almost in a voice of triumph, as he struck his hand upon the letter. "Paine was right when he spoke of a shaky investment. That comes of women pretending to understand business. A pretty mess they seem to have made of it!"

"Mother," said poor Dick, coming up to her when he found himself alone with her for a moment, "I don't understand this letter. I cannot read between the lines, somehow, and yet there seems something more than meets the eye."

"I am sure it is bad enough," returned Mrs. Mayne, who had been quietly crying over Nan's postscript. "Think of them leaving Glen Cottage, and of these poor dear girls having to make themselves useful!"

"It is just that that bothers me so," replied Dick, with a frowning brow. "The letter tells us so little; it is so constrained in tone; as though they were keeping something from us. Of course they have something to live upon, but I am afraid it is very little."

"Very likely they will only have one servant,—just Dorothy and no one else; and the girls will have to help in the house," returned his mother, thoughtfully. "That will not do them any harm, Dick: it always improves girls to make them useful. I dare say the Friary is a very small place, and then I am sure, with a little help, Dorothy will do very well."

"But, mother," pleaded Dick, who was somewhat comforted by this sensible view of the matter, "do write to Nan or Phillis and beg of them to give us fuller particulars." And, though Mrs. Mayne promised she would do so, and kept her word, Dick was not satisfied, but sat down and scrawled a long letter to Mrs. Challoner, so incoherent in its expressions of sympathy and regret that it quite mystified her; but Nan thought it perfect, and took possession of it, and read it every day, until it got quite thin and worn. One sentence especially pleased her. "I don't intend ever to cross the threshold of the cottage again," wrote Dick: "in fact, Oldfield will be hateful without you all. Of course I shall run down to Hadleigh at Christmas and look you up, and see for myself what sort of a place the Friary is. Tell Nan I will get her lots of roses for her garden so she need not trouble about that; and give them my love, and tell them how awfully sorry I am about it all."

Poor Dick! the news of his friends' misfortunes took off the edge of his enjoyment for a long time. Thanks to Nan's unselfishness, he did not in the least realize the true state of affairs; nevertheless, his honest heart was heavy at the thought of the empty cottage, and he was quite right in saying Oldfield had grown suddenly hateful to him, and, though he kept these thoughts to himself as much as possible, Mr. Mayne saw that his son was depressed and ill at ease, and sent him away to the Swiss Tyrol, with a gay party of young people, hoping a few weeks' change would put the Challoners out of his head. Meanwhile Nan and her sisters worked busily, and their friends crowded round them, helping or hindering, according to their nature.

On the last afternoon there was a regular invasion of the cottage. The drawing-room carpet was up, and the room was full of packing-cases. Carrie Paine had taken possession of one and her sister Sophy and Lily Twentyman had a turned-up box between them. Miss Sartoris and Gussie Scobell had wicker chairs. Dorothy had just brought in tea, and had placed before Nan a heterogeneous assemblage of kitchen cups and saucers, mugs, and odds and ends of crockery, when Lady Fitzroy entered in her habit, accompanied by her sister, the Honorable Maud Burgoyne, both of whom seemed to enjoy the picnic excessively.

"Do let me have the mug," implored Miss Burgoyne: she was a pretty little brunette with a nez retrousse. "I have never drunk out of one since my nursery days. How cool it is, after the sunny roads! I think carpets ought to be abolished in the summer. When I have a house of my own, Evelyn, I mean to have Indian matting and nothing else in the warm weather."

"I am very fond of Indian matting," returned her sister, sipping her tea contentedly. "Fitzroy hoped to have looked in this afternoon, Mrs. Challoner, to say good-bye, but there is an assault-at-arms at the Albert Hall, and he is taking my young brother Algernon to see it. He is quite inconsolable at the thought of losing such pleasant neighbors, and sent all sorts of pretty messages," finished Lady Fitzroy, graciously.

"Here is Edgar," exclaimed Carrie Paine; "he told us that he meant to put in an appearance; but I am afraid the poor boy will find himself de trop among so many ladies."

Edgar was the youngest Paine,—a tall Eton boy, who looked as though he would soon be too big for jackets, and an especial friend of Nan's.

"How good of you to come and say good-bye, Gar!" she said summoning him to her side, as the boy looked round him blushing and half terrified. "What have you got there under your jacket?"

"It is the puppy I promised you," returned Edgar, eagerly; "don't you know?—Nell's puppy? Father said I might have it." And he deposited a fat black retriever puppy at Nan's feet. The little beast made a clumsy rush at her and then rolled over on its back. Nan took it up in high delight, and showed it to her mother.

"Isn't it good of Gar, mother? and when we all wanted a dog so! We have never had a pet since poor old Juno died; and this will be such a splendid fellow when he grows up. Look at his head and curly black paws; and what a dear solemn face he has got!"

"I am glad you like him," replied Edgar, who was now perfectly at his ease. "We have christened him 'Laddie:' he is the handsomest puppy of the lot, and our man Jake says he is perfectly healthy." And then, as Nan cut him some cake, he proceeded to enlighten her on the treatment of this valuable animal.

The arrival of "Laddie" made quite a diversion, and, when the good-byes were all said, Nan took the little animal in her arms and went with Phillis for the last time to gather flowers in the Longmead garden, and when the twilight came on the three girls went slowly through the village, bidding farewell to their old haunts.

It was all very sad, and nobody slept much that night in the cottage. Nan's tears were shed very quietly, but they fell thick and fast.

"Oh, Dick, it is hard—hard!" thought the poor girl, burying her face in the pillow; "but I have not let you know the day, so you will not be thinking of us. I would not pain you for worlds, Dick, not more than I can help." And then she dried her eyes and told herself that she must be brave for all their sakes to-morrow; but, for all her good resolutions, sleep would not come to her any more than it did to Phillis, who lay open-eyed and miserable until morning.



CHAPTER XIII.

"I MUST HAVE GRACE."

When the Rev. Archibald Drummond was nominated to the living of Hadleigh in Sussex, it was at once understood by his family that he had achieved a decided success in life.

Hadleigh until very recently had been a perpetual curacy, and the perpetual curate in charge had lived in the large, shabby house with the green door on the Braidwood Road, as it was called. There had been some talk of a new vicarage, but as yet the first brick had not been laid, the building-committee had fallen out on the question of the site, and nothing had been definitely arranged: there was a good deal of talk, too, about the church restoration, but at the present moment nothing had been done.

Mr. Drummond had not been disturbed in his mind by the delay of the building-committee in the matter of the new vicarage, but on the topic of the church restoration he had been heard to say very bitter things,—far too bitter, it was thought, to proceed from the lips of such a new-comer. It is not always wise to be outspoken, and when Mr. Drummond expressed himself a little too frankly on the ugliness of the sacred edifice, which until lately had been a chapel-of-ease, he had caused a great deal of dissatisfaction in the mind of his hearers; but when the young vicar, still strongly imbued with the beauties of Oxford architecture, had looked round blankly on the great square pews and galleries, and then at the wooden pulpit, and the Ten Commandments that adorned the east end, he was not quite so sure in his mind that his position was as enviable as that of other men.

Church architecture was his hobby, and, if the truth must be told, he was a little "High" in his views; without attaching himself to the Ultra-Ritualistic party, he was still strongly impregnated with many of their ideas; he preferred Gregorian to Anglican chants, and would have had no objection to incense if his diocesan could have been brought to appreciate it too.

An ornate service was decidedly to his taste. It was, therefore, a severe mortification when he found himself compelled to minister Sunday after Sunday in a building that was ugly enough for a conventicle, and to listen to the florid voices of a mixed choir, instead of the orderly array of men and boys in white surplices to which he had been accustomed. If he had been combative by nature,—one who loved to gird his armor about him and to plunge into every sort of melee,—he would have rejoiced after a fashion at the thought of the work cut out for him, of bringing order and beauty out of this chaos; but he was by nature too impatient. He would have condemned and destroyed instead of trying to renovate.

"Why not build a new church at once?" he said, with a certain youthful intolerance that made people angry. "Never mind the vicarage; the old house will last my time: but a place like this—a rising place—ought to have a church worthy of it. It will be money thrown away to restore this one," finished the young vicar, looking round him with sorely troubled eyes; and it was this outspoken frankness that had lost him popularity at first.

But, if the new vicar had secret cause for discontent in the Drummond family there was nothing but the sweetness of triumph.

"Archie has never given me a moment's trouble from his birth," his proud mother was wont to declare; and it must be owned that the young man had done very fairly for himself.

There had been plenty of anxiety in the Drummond household while Archibald was enjoying his first Oxford term. Things had come to a climax: his father, who was a Leeds manufacturer, had failed most utterly, and to a large amount. The firm of Drummond & Drummond, once known as a most respectable and reliable firm, had come suddenly, but not unexpectedly to the ground; and Archibald Drummond the elder had been compelled to accept a managership in the very firm that, by competition and underselling, had helped to ruin him.

It was a heavy trial to a man of Mr. Drummond's proud temperament; but he went through with it in a tough, dogged way that excited his wife's admiration. True, his bread was bitter to him for a long time, and the sweetness of life, as he told himself, was over for him; but he had a large family to maintain, sons and daughters growing up around him, and the youngest was not yet six months old; under such circumstances a man may be induced to put his pride in his pocket.

"Your father has grown quite gray, and has begun to stoop. It makes my heart quite ache to see him sometimes," Mrs. Drummond wrote to her eldest son; "but he never says a word to any of us. He just goes through with it day after day."

At that time Archie was her great comfort. He had begun to make his own way early in life, understanding from the first that his parents could do very little for him. He had worked well at school, and had succeeded in obtaining one or two scholarships. When his university life commenced, and the household at Leeds became straitened in their circumstances, he determined not to encumber them with his presence.

He soon became known in his college as a reading-man and a steady worker; he was fortunate, too, in obtaining pupils for the long vacation. By and by he became a fellow and tutor of his college, and before he was eight-and-twenty the living of Hadleigh was offered to him. It was not at all a rich living,—not being worth more than three hundred a year,—and some of his Oxford friends would have dissuaded him from accepting it; but Archibald Drummond was not of their opinion. Oxford did not suit his constitution; he was never well there. Sussex air, and especially the sea-side, would give him just the tone he required. He liked the big old-fashioned house that would be allotted to him. He could take pupils and add to his income in that way; at present he had his fellowship. It was only in the event of his marriage that his income might not be found sufficient. At the present moment he had no matrimonial intentions: there was only one thing on which he was determined, and that was, that Grace must live with him and keep his house.

Grace was the sister next to him in age. Mattie,—or Matilda, as her mother often called her,—was the eldest of the family, and was two years older than Archibald. Between him and Grace there were two brothers, Fred and Clyde, and beyond Grace a string of girls ending in Dottie, who was not yet ten. Archibald used to forget their ages and mix them up in the most helpless way; he was never quite sure if Isabel were eighteen or twenty, or whether Clara or Susie came next. He once forgot Laura altogether, and was only reminded of her existence by the shock of surprise at seeing the awkward-looking, ungainly girl standing before him, looking shyly up in his face.

Archibald was never quite alive to the blessing of having seven sisters, none of them with any pretension to beauty, unless it were Grace, though he was obliged to confess on his last visit to Leeds that Isabel was certainly passable-looking. He tried to take a proper amount of interest in them and be serenely unconscious of their want of grace and polish; but the effort was too manifest, and neither Clara nor Susie nor Laura regarded their grave elder brother with any lively degree of affection. Mrs. Drummond was a somewhat stern and exacting mother, but she was never so difficult to please as when her eldest son was at home.

"Home is never so comfortable when Archie is in it," Susie would grumble to her favorite confidante, Grace. "Every one is obliged to be on their best behavior; and yet mother finds fault from morning to night. Dottie is crying now because she has been scolded for coming down to tea in a dirty pinafore."

"Oh, hush, Susie dear! you ought not to say such things," returned Grace, in her quiet voice.

Poor Grace! these visits of Archie were her only pleasures. The brother and sister were devoted to each other. In Archie's eyes not one of the others was to be compared to her; and in this he was perfectly right.

Grace Drummond was a tall, sweet-looking girl of two-and-twenty,—not pretty, except in her brother's opinion, but possessing a soft, fair comeliness that made her pleasant to look upon. In voice and manner she was extremely quiet,—almost grave; and only those who lived with her had any idea of the repressed strength and energy of her character, and the almost masculine clearness of intellect that lay under the soft exterior. One side of her nature was hidden from every one but her brother, and to him only revealed by intermittent flashes, and that was the passionate absorption of her affection in him. To her parents she was dutiful and submissive, but when she grew up the yoke of her mother's will was felt to be oppressive. Her father's nature was more in sympathy with her own; but even with him she was reticent. She was good to all her brothers and sisters, and especially devoted to Dottie; but her affection for them was so strongly pervaded by anxiety and the overweight of responsibility that its pains overbalanced its pleasures. She loved them, and toiled in their service from morning to night; but as yet she had not felt herself rewarded by any decided success. But in Archie her pride was equal to her love; she was critical, and her standard was somewhat high, but he satisfied her. What other people recognized as faults, she regarded as the merest blemishes. Without being absolutely faultless, which was of course impossible in a creature of flesh and blood, he was still as near perfection, she thought, as he could be. Perhaps her affection for him blinded her somewhat, and cast a sort of loving glamour over her eyes; for it must be owned that Archibald was by no means extraordinary in either goodness or cleverness. From a boy she had watched his career with dazzled eyes, rejoicing in every stroke of success that came to him as though it were her own. Her own life was dull and laborious, spent in the overcrowded house in Lowder Street, but she forgot it in following his. Now and then bright days came to her,—few in number, but absolutely golden, when this dearly-loved brother came on a brief visit,—when they had snatches of delicious talk in the empty school-room at the top of the house, or he took her out with him for a long, quiet walk.

Mrs. Drummond always made some dry sarcastic remark when they came in, for she was secretly jealous of Archie's affection for Grace. Hers was rather a monopolizing nature, and she would willingly have had the first share in her son's affections. It somewhat displeased her to see him so wrapt up in the one sister to the exclusion of all the others, as she told him.

"I think you might have asked Matilda or Isabel to accompany you. The poor girls never see anything of you, Archie," she would say plaintively to her son. But to Grace she would speak somewhat sharply, bidding her fulfil some neglected duty, which another could as well have performed, and making her at once understand by her manner that she was to blame in leaving Mattie at home.

"Mother," Archibald said to her one day, when she had spoken with unusual severity, and the poor girl had retreated from the room, feeling as though she had been convicted of selfishness, "we must settle the matter about which I spoke to you last night. I have been thinking about it ever since. Mattie will not do at all. I must have Grace!"

Mrs. Drummond looked up from her mending, and her thin lips settled into a hard line that they always took when her mind was made up on a disagreeable subject. She had a pinafore belonging to Dottie in her hand; there was a jagged rent in it, and she sighed impatiently as she put it down; though she was not a woman who shirked any of her maternal duties, she had often been heard to say that her work was never done, and that her mending-basket was never empty.

"But if I cannot spare Grace," she said, rather shortly, as she meditated another lecture to the delinquent Dottie.

"But, mother, you must spare her!" returned her son, eagerly, leaning his elbow on the mantelpiece, and watching her rapid manipulations with apparent interest. "Look here; I am quite in earnest. I have set my heart on having Grace. She is just the one to manage a clergyman's household. She would be my right hand in the parish."

"She is our right hand too, Archie; but I suppose we are to cut it off, that it may benefit you and your parish."

Mrs. Drummond seldom spoke so sharply to her eldest son; but this request of his was grievous to her.

"I think Grace ought to be considered, too, in the matter," he returned, somwhat sullenly. "She works harder than any paid governess, and gets small thanks for her trouble."

"She does her duty," returned Mrs. Drummond, coldly,—she very seldom praised any of her children,—"but not more than Mattie does hers. You are prejudiced strongly against your sister, Archie; you are not fair to her in any way. Mattie is a capital little housekeeper. She is economical, and full of clever contrivances. It is not as though I asked you to try Isabel. She is well enough, too, in her way, but a little flighty, and rather too pretty, perhaps—" but here a laugh from Archie grated on her ear.

"Too pretty!—what an absurd idea! The girl is passable-looking, and I will not deny that she has improved lately; but, mother, there is not one of the girls that can be called pretty except Grace."

Mrs. Drummond winced at her son's outspoken words. The plainness of her daughters was a sore subject.

She had never understood why her girls were so ordinary-looking. She had been a handsome girl in her time, and was still a fine-looking woman. Her husband, too, had had a fair amount of good looks, and, though he stooped, was still admirable in her eyes. The boys, too, were thoroughly fine fellows. Fred was decidedly handsome, and so was Clyde; and as for her favorite Archie, Mrs. Drummond glanced up at him as he stood beside her.

He certainly looked a model young clergyman. His features were good, but the lower part of his face was quite hidden by the fair mustache and the soft silky beard. He had thoughtful gray eyes, which could look as severe as hers sometimes; and, though his shoulders were somewhat too sloping, there could be no fault found with his figure. He was as nice-looking as possible, she thought, and no mother could have been better satisfied. But why, with the exception of Grace and Isabel, were her girls so deficient in outward graces? It could not be denied that they were very ordinary girls. Laura was overgrown and freckled, and had red hair; Susie was sickly-looking, and so short-sighted that they feared she would have to take to spectacles; and Clara was stolid and heavy-looking, one of those thick-set girls that dress never seems to improve. Dottie had a funny little face; but one could not judge of her yet. And Mattie,—Mrs. Drummond sighed again as she thought of her eldest daughter,—Mattie was thirty; and her mother felt she would never marry. It was not that she was so absolutely plain,—people who liked her said Mattie had a nice face,—but she was so abrupt, so uncouth in her awkwardness, such a stranger to the minor morals of life, that it would be a wonder indeed if she could find favor in any man's eyes.

"I do think you are too hard on your sisters," returned Mrs. Drummond, stung by her son's remark. "Isabel was very much admired at her first party last week. Mrs. Cochrane told me so, and so did Miss Blair." She could have added that her maternal interest had been strongly stirred by the mention of a certain Mr. Ellis Burton, who she had understood had paid a great deal of attention that evening to Isabel, and who was the eldest son of a wealthy manufacturer in Leeds. But Mrs. Drummond had some good old-fashioned notions, and one of these was never to speak on such delicate subjects as the matrimonial prospects of her daughters: indeed, she often thanked heaven she was not a match-making mother,—which was as well, under the circumstances.

"Well, well, we are not talking about Isabel," returned her son, impatiently. "The question is about Grace, mother. I really do wish very much that you and my father would stretch a point for me here. I want her more than I can say."

"But, Archie, you must be reasonable. Just think a moment. Your father cannot afford to send the girls to school, or to pay for a good finishing governess. We have given Grace every advantage; and just as she is making herself really useful to me in the school-room, you want to deprive me of her services."

"You know I offered to pay for Clara's schooling," returned her son, reproachfully. "She is more than sixteen, is she not! Surely Mattie could teach the others?"

But Mrs. Drummond's clear, concise voice interrupted him:

"Archie, how can you talk such nonsense? You know poor Mattie was never good at book-learning. She would hardly do for Dottie. Ask Grace, if you doubt my word."

"Of course I do not doubt it, mother," in rather an aggravated voice, for he felt he was having the worst of the argument.

"Then why do you not believe me when I tell you the thing you ask is impossible?" replied his mother more calmly. "I am sorry for you if you are disappointed, Archie; but you undervalue Mattie,—you do indeed. She will make you a nice little housekeeper, and, though she is not clever, she is so amiable that nothing ever puts her out; and visiting the poor and sick-nursing are more in her line than in Grace's. Mrs. Blair finds her invaluable. She wanted her for one of her district visitors, and I said she had too much to do at home."

Archie shrugged his shoulders. Mrs. Blair was the wife of the vicar of All Saints', where the Drummonds attended, and from a boy she had been his pet aversion. She was a bustling, managing woman, and of course Mattie was just to her taste. He did not see much use in continuing the conversation; with all his affection for his mother,—and she was better loved by her sons than by her daughters,—he knew her to be as immovable as a rock when she had once made up her mind. He thought at first of appealing to his father on Grace's behalf, but abandoned this notion after a few minutes' reflection. His father was decided and firm in all matters relating to business, but for many years past he had abandoned the domestic reins to his wife's capable hands. Perhaps he had proved her worth and prudence; perhaps he thought the management of seven daughters too much for any man. Anyhow, he interfered less and less as the years went on; and if at any time he differed from his wife, she could always talk him over, as her son well knew.

When the subject had been first mooted in the household, he had said a word or two to his father, and had found him very reluctant to entertain the idea of parting with Grace. She was his favorite daughter, and he thought how he should miss her when he came home weary and jaded at night.

"I don't think it will do at all," he had said, in an undecided dissatisfied tone. "Won't one of the other girls serve your turn? There's Mattie, or that little monkey Isabel, she is as pert and lively as possible. But Grace; why, she is every one's right hand. What would the mother or the young ones do without her?"

No; it was no use appealing to his father, Archie thought, and might only make mischief in the house. He and Grace must make up their mind to a few more years' separation. He turned away after his mother's last speech, and finally left the room without saying another word. There was a cloud on his face, and Mrs. Drummond saw that he was much displeased; but, though she sighed again as she took up a pair of Clyde's socks and inspected them carefully, there was no change in her resolution that Mattie, and not Grace, should go to the vicarage for the year's visit that was all Archie had asked.

There are mothers and mothers in this world,—some who are capable of sacrificing their children to Moloch, who will barter their own flesh and blood in return for some barren heritage or other. There are those who will exact from those dependent on them heavy tithes of daily patience and uncomplaining drudgery; while others, who are "mothers indeed" give all, asking for nothing in return.

Mrs. Drummond was a good woman. She had many virtues and few faults. She was lady-like, industrious and self-denying in her own personal comforts, an exemplary wife, and a tolerant mistress; but she was better understood by her sons than by her daughters.

Her maternal instincts were very strong, and no mother had more delighted in her nursery than she had in hers. As long as there was a baby in the house the tenderness of her love was apparent enough. She wore herself out tending her infants, and no one ever heard her say a harsh word in her nursery.

But as her children grew up, there was much clashing of wills in the household. Her sons did not fear her in the least; but with her daughters it was otherwise. They felt the mother's strong will repressive; it threatened to dwarf their individuality and cramp that free growth that is so necessary to young things.

Dottie, who by virtue of being the last baby had had more than her fair amount of petting, was only just beginning to learn her lesson of unquestioning obedience; and, as she was somewhat spoiled, her lesson was hard one. But Laura and Susie and Clara had not yet found out that their mother loved them and wished to be their friend; they were timid and reserved with her, and took all their troubles to Grace. Even Mattie, who was her first-born, and who was old enough to be her mother's companion, quailed and blushed like a child under the dry caustic speeches at which Clyde and Fred only laughed.

"You don't understand the mother. Her bark is worse than her bite," Clyde would say to his sister sometimes. "She is an awfully clever woman, and it riles her to see herself surrounded by such a set of ninnies. Now, don't sulk, Belle. You know Mattie's a duffer compared to Grace; aren't you, Matt?"

At which truism poor Mattie would hang her head.

"Yes, Clyde; I know I am dreadfully stupid sometimes, and that makes mother angry."

Mrs. Drummond often complained bitterly of her daughters' want of confidence in her, but she never blamed herself for the barrier that seemed between them. She was forever asserting maternal authority, when such questions might have been safely laid to rest between her and her grown-up daughters. Mrs. Challoner's oneness of sympathy with her girls, her lax discipline, her perfect equality, would have shocked a woman of Mrs. Drummond's calibre. She would not have tolerated or understood it for a moment.

"My girls must do as I wish," was a very ordinary speech in her mouth. "I always do as my girls wish," Mrs. Challoner would have said. And, indeed, the two mothers were utterly dissimilar; but it may be doubted whether the Challoner household were not far happier than the family in Lowder Street.



CHAPTER XIV.

"YOU CAN DARE TO TELL ME THESE THINGS."

Archibald Drummond had left his mother's presence with a cloud on his brow. He had plenty of filial affection for her, but it was not the first time that he had found her too much for him. She had often angered him before by her treatment of Grace, but he had told himself that she was his mother, that a man could have but one, and so he had brought himself to forgive her. But this time she had set herself against the cherished plan of years. He had always looked forward to the time when he could have Grace to live with him; they had made all sorts of schemes together, and all their talk had concentrated itself towards this point; the disappointment would place a sort of blankness before them; they would be working separately, far away from each other, and the distance would not be bridged for years.

He stood for a moment in the dark, narrow hall, thinking intently over all this, and then he went slowly upstairs. He knew where he should find Grace. His mother had paid an unwonted visit to the school-room during their walk, and on their return had expressed herself with some degree of sharpness on the disorder she had found there. Grace would be busily engaged in putting everything to rights. It was Clara's business, but she had gone out, and had, as usual, forgotten all about it. Grace had taken the blame upon herself, of course: she was always shielding her younger sisters.

Everything was done when he entered the room, and Grace was sitting by the window, with her hands folded in her lap, indulging in a few minutes' rare idleness. She looked up eagerly as her brother made his appearance.

The school-room was a large, bare-looking room at the top of the house, with two narrow windows looking out over a lively prospect of roofs and chimney-pots. Mrs. Drummond had done her utmost to give it an air of comfort, but it was, on the whole, a dull, uncomfortable apartment, in spite of the faded Turkey carpet, and the curtains that had once been so handsome, but had now merged into unwholesome neutral tints.

Laura, who was the wit of the family, had nicknamed it the Hospital, for it seemed to be a receptacle for all the maimed and rickety chairs of the household, footstools in a dilapidated condition, and odd pieces of lumber that had no other place. Archibald regarded it with a troubled gaze; somehow, its dinginess had never before so impressed him; and then as he looked at his sister the frown deepened on his face.

"Well, Archie?"

"Oh, Grace, it is no use! I have talked myself hoarse, but the mother is dead against it: one might as well try to move a rock. We shall have to make up our minds to bear our disappointment as well as we can."

"I knew it was hopeless from the first," returned Grace, slowly; but, as she spoke, a sort of dimness and paleness crept over her face, belying her words.

She was young, and in youth hope never dies. Beyond the gray daily horizon there is always a possible gleam, a new to-morrow; youth abounds in infinite surprises, in probabilities which are as large as they are vague. Grace told herself that she never hoped much from Archie's mission; yet when he came to her with his ill success plainly stamped upon his countenance, the dying out of her dream was bitter to her.

"I knew it was hopeless from the first," had been her answer, and then breath for further words failed her, and she sat motionless, with her hands clasped tightly together, while Archie placed himself on the window-seat beside her and looked out ruefully at the opposite chimneys.

Well, it was all over, this dearly-cherished scheme of theirs; she must go on now with the dull routine of daily duties, she must stoop her neck afresh to the yoke she had long found so galling; this school-room must be her world, she must not hope any longer for wider vistas, for more expansive horizons, for tasks that should be more congenial to her, for all that was now made impossible.

Mattie, not she, must go and keep Archie's house, and here for a moment she closed her eyes, the pain was so bitter; she thought of the old vicarage, of the garden where she and Archie were to have worked, of the shabby old study where he meant to write his sermons, while she was to sit beside him with her book or needlework, of the evenings when he had promised to read to her, of the walks they were to have taken together, of all the dear delightful plans they had made.

And now her mother had said them nay; it was Mattie who was to be his housekeeper, who would sit opposite to him and pour out his coffee, who would mend his socks and do all the thousand-and-one things that a woman delights in doing for the mankind dependent on her for comfort.

Mattie would visit his poor people, and teach in the schools, entertain his friends, and listen to his voice every Sunday; here tears slowly gathered under the closed eyelids. Yes, Mattie would do all that, but she would not be his chosen friend and companion; there would be no long charming talks for her in the study or the sunny garden; he would be as lonely, poor fellow, in his way as she would be in hers, and for this her mother was to blame.

"Well, Gracie, haven't you a word to say?" asked her brother, at last, surprised at her long silence.

"No, Archie; it does not bear talking about," she returned, so passionately that he turned round to look at her. "I must not even think of it. I must try and shut it all out of my mind, or I shall be no good to any one. But it is hard—hard!" with a quiver of her lip.

"I call it a shame for my father and mother to sacrifice you in this way!" he burst out, moved to bitter indignation at the sight of her trouble. "I shall tell my father what I think about it pretty plainly!"

But this speech recalled Grace to her senses.

"Oh, no, dear! you must do no such thing: promise me you will not. It would be no good at all; and it would only make mother so angry. You know he always thinks as she does about things, so it would be no use. I suppose"—with an impatient sigh—"that I ought to feel myself complimented at knowing I cannot be spared. Some girls would be proud to feel themselves their mother's right hand; but to me it does not seem much of a privilege."

"Don't talk in that way, Grace: it makes me miserable to hear you. I am more sorry for you than I am for myself, and yet I am sorry for myself too. If it were not that my mother would be too deeply offended, I would refuse to have Mattie at all. We never have got on well together. She is a good little thing in her way, but her awkwardness and left-handed ways will worry me incessantly. And then we have not an idea in common——" but here Grace generously interposed:

"Poor old fellow! as though I did not know all that; but you must not vent it on poor Mattie. She is not to blame for our disappointment. She would gladly give it up to me if she could. I know she will do her utmost to please you, Archie, and she is so good and amiable that you must overlook her little failings and make the best of her."

"It will be rather difficult work, I am afraid," returned her brother, grimly. "I shall always be drawing invidious comparisons between you both, and thinking what you would do in her place."

"All the same you must try and be good to her for my sake, for I am very fond of Mattie," she returned, gently; but he could not help feeling gratified at the assurance that he would miss her. And then she put her hand on his coat-sleeve, and stroked it, a favorite caress with her. "It does not bear talking about: does it, Archie? It only makes it feel worse. I think it must be meant as a discipline for me, because I am so wicked, and that it would not do at all for me to be too happy." And here she pressed his arm, and looked up in his face, with an attempt at a smile.

"No, you are right: talking only makes it worse," he returned, hurriedly; and then he stooped—for he was a tall man—and kissed her on the forehead just between her eyes, and then walked to the door, whistling a light air.

Grace did not think him at all abrupt in thus breaking off the conversation. She had caught his meaning in a moment, and knew the whole business was so painful to him that he did not care to dwell on it. When the tea-bell rang, she prepared herself at once to accompany him downstairs.

It was Archibald's last evening at home, and all the family were gathered round the long tea-table. Since Mr. Drummond's misfortunes, late dinners had been relinquished, and more homely habits prevailed in the household. Mrs. Drummond had, indeed, apologized to her son more than once for the simplicity of their mode of life.

"You are accustomed to a late dinner, Archie. I wish I could have managed it for you; but your father objects to any alteration being made in our usual habits."

"He is quite right; and I should have been much distressed if you had thought such alteration necessary," returned her son, very much surprised at this reference to his father. For Mrs. Drummond rarely consulted her husband on such matters. In this case, however, she had done so, and Mr. Drummond had been unusually testy—indeed, affronted—at such a question being put to him.

"I don't know what you mean, Isabella," he had replied; "but I suppose what is good enough for me is good enough for Archie." And then Mrs. Drummond knew she had made a mistake, for her husband had felt bitterly the loss of his late dinner. So Archie tried to fall in with the habits of his family, and to enjoy the large plum or seed-cake that invariably garnished the tea-table; and, though he ate but sparingly of the supper, which always gave him indigestion, Grace was his only confidante in the matter. Mr. Drummond, indeed, looked at his son rather sharply once or twice, as though he suspected him of fastidiousness. "I cannot compliment you on your appetite," he would say, as he helped himself to cold meat; "but perhaps our home fare is not so tempting as Oxford living?"

"I always say your meat is unusually good," returned Archibald, amicably. "If there be any fault, it is in my appetite; but that Hadleigh air will soon set right." But, though he answered his father after this tolerant fashion, he always added, in a mental aside, that nine-o'clock suppers were certainly barbarous institutions, and peculiarly deleterious to the constitution of an Oxford fellow.

Mrs. Drummond looked at them both somewhat keenly as they entered. In spite of her resolution, she was secretly uncomfortable at the thought that Archie was displeased with her: her daughter's vexation was a burden that could be more easily borne; but her maternal heart yearned for some token that her boy was not estranged from her. But no such consolation was to be vouchsafed to her. She had kept his usual place vacant beside her; Archie showed no intention of taking it. He placed himself by his father, and began talking to him of a change of ministry that was impending, and which would overthrow the Conservative party. Mrs. Drummond, who was one of those women who can never be made to take any interest in politics, was reduced to the necessity of talking to Mattie in an undertone, for the other boys never put in an appearance at this meal; but as she talked she took stock of Grace's pale, abstracted looks as she sat with her plate before her, not pretending to eat, and taking no notice of Susie and Laura, who chatted busily across her.

It was not a festive meal; on the contrary, there was an unusual air of restraint over the whole party. The younger members felt instinctively that there was something amiss. Archie looked decidedly glum; and there was an expression on the mother's face that they were not slow to interpret. No one could hear what it was she was saying to Mattie that made her look so red and nervous all at once; but presently she addressed herself abruptly to her husband:

"It is all settled, father. I have arranged with Archie that Matilda should go down to Hadleigh next month."

Archie stroked his beard, but did not look up or make any remark, though poor Mattie looked at him beseechingly across the table, as though imploring a word. His mother would carry her point; but he would not pretend for a moment that he was otherwise than displeased, or that Mattie would be welcome.

His silence attracted Mr. Drummond's attention.

"Oh, what, you have settled it, you say? I hope you are satisfied, Archie, and properly grateful to your mother for sparing Mattie. She is to go for a year. Well, it will be a grand change for her. I should not be surprised if you were to pick up a husband, Miss Mattie;" for Mr. Drummond was a man who, in spite of his cares, was not without his joke; but, as usual, it was instantly frowned down by his wife:

"I wonder at you, father, talking such nonsense before the children. Why are you giggling, Laura? It is very unseemly and ill-behaved. I hope no daughter of mine has such unmaidenly notions. Mattie is going to Hadleigh to be a comfort to her brother, and to keep his house as a clergyman's house ought to be kept."

"And you are satisfied, Archie?" asked Mr. Drummond, not quite pleased at his wife's reprimand, and struck anew by his son's silence.

"I consider these questions somewhat unnecessary. You know my wishes, sir, on the subject, and my mother also," was the somewhat uncompromising remark; "but it appears that they are not to be met in this instance. I hope Mattie will be comfortable and not miss her sisters;" but he did not look at the poor girl, and the tears came into her eyes.

"Oh, Archie, I am so sorry! I never meant——-" she stammered; but her mother interrupted her:

"There is no occasion for you to be sorry about anything; you had far better be silent, Mattie. But you have no tact. Father, if you have finished your tea, I suppose you and Archie are going out." And then Archie rose from the table, and followed his father out of the room.

It was Isabel's business to put Dottie to bed. The other girls had to prepare their lessons for the next day, and went up to the school-room. Mattie made some excuse, and went with them, and Mrs. Drummond and Grace were left alone.

Grace had some delicate work to finish, and she placed herself by the lamp. Her mother had returned to her mending-basket; but as the door closed upon Mattie, she cleared her throat, and looked at her daughter.

"Grace, I must say I am surprised at you!"

"Why, mother?" But Grace did not look up from the task she was running with such fine even stitches.

"I am more than surprised!" continued Mrs. Drummond, severely. "I am disappointed to see in what a bad spirit you have received my decision. I did not think a daughter of mine would have been so blind to her sense of duty!"

"I have said nothing to make you think that."

"No, you have said nothing, but looks can be eloquent sometimes. I am not speaking of Archie, though I can see he is put out too, for he is a man, and men are not always reasonable; but that you should place yourself in such silent opposition to my wishes, it is that that shocks me."

There was an ominous sparkle in Grace's gray eyes, and then she deliberately put down her work on the table. She had hoped that her mother would have been contented with her victory, and not have spoken to her on the subject. But if she were so attacked, she would at least defend herself.

"You have no right to speak to me in this way, mother!"

"No right, Grace?" Mrs. Drummond could hardly believe her ears. Never once had a daughter of hers questioned her right in anything.

"No; for I have said nothing to bring all this upon me! I have been perfectly quiet, and have tried to bear the bitterness of my disappointment as well as I could. No one is answerable for their looks, and I, at least, will not plead guilty on that score."

"Grace, you are answering me very improperly."

"I cannot say that I think so, mother. I would have been silent, if you had permitted such silence; but when you drive me to speech, I must say what I feel to be the truth,—that I have not been well treated in this matter."

"Grace!" And Mrs. Drummond paused in awful silence. Never before had a recusant daughter braved her to her face.

"I have not been well treated," continued Grace, firmly, "in a thing that concerns me more than any one else. I have not even been consulted. You have arranged it all, mother, without reference to me or my feelings. Perhaps I ought to be grateful for being spared so painful a decision; but I think such a decision should have been permitted to me."

"You can dare to tell me such things to my very face!"

"Why should I not tell them?" returned Grace, meeting her mother's angry glance unflinchingly. "It seems to me that one should speak the truth to one's mother. You have treated me like a child; and I have a right to feel sore and indignant. Why did you not put the whole thing before me, and tell me that you and my father did not see how you could spare me? Do you really believe that I should have been so wanting to my sense of duty as to follow my own pleasure?"

"Grace, I insist upon your silence! I will not discuss the matter with you."

"If you insist upon silence, you must be obeyed, mother: but it is you who have raised the question between us. But when you attack me unjustly, I must defend myself."

"You are forgetting yourself strangely. Your words are most disrespectful and unbecoming in a daughter. You tell me to my face that I am unjust—I, your mother—because I have been compelled to thwart your wishes."

"No, no—not because of that!" returned Grace, in a voice of passionate pain; "why will you misunderstand me so?—but because you have no faith in me. You treat me like a child. You dispute my privilege to decide in a matter that concerns my own happiness. You bid me work for you, and you give me no wage—not a word of praise; and because I remonstrate for once in my life, you insist on my silence."

"It seems that I am not to be obeyed."

"Oh, yes; you will be obeyed, mother. After to-night I will not open my lips to offend you again. If I have said more than I ought to have said as a daughter, I will ask your pardon now; but I cannot take back one of my words. They are true,—true!"

"I must say your apology is tardy, Grace."

"Nevertheless, it is an apology; for, though you have hurt me, I must not forget you are my mother. I know my life will be harder after this, because of what I have said; and yet I would not take back one of my words!"

"I am more displeased with you than I can say," returned her mother, taking up her neglected work; and her mouth looked stern and hard.

Never had her aspect been so forbidding, and yet never had her daughter feared her less.

"Then, if you are displeased with me, I will go away," replied Grace, moving from her seat with gentle dignity. "I wish you had not compelled me to speak, mother, and then I should not have offended you: but as it is there is no help for it." And then she gathered up her work and walked slowly out of the room.

Mrs. Drummond sat moodily in the empty room that had somehow never seemed so empty before. Her attitude was as rigid and uncompromising as usual; but there was a perplexed frown on her brow. For the first time in her life one of her girls had dared to assert her own will and to speak the truth to her; and she was utterly nonplussed. It was not too much to say that she had received a blow. Her justice and sense of fairness had been questioned,—her very maternal authority impugned,—and that by one of her own children! Mattie, who was eight years older, would not have ventured to cross her mother's will. Grace had so dared; and she was bitterly angry with her. And yet she had never so admired her before.

How honestly and bravely she had battled for her rights! her gray eyes had shone with fire, her pale cheeks had glowed with the passion of her words: for once in her life the girl had looked superbly handsome.

"You have no faith in me; you treat me like a child." Well, she was right; it was no child, it was a proud woman who was flinging those hard words at her. For the first time Mrs. Drummond recognized the possibility of a will as strong as her own. In spite of all her authority, Grace had been a match for her mother: Mrs. Drummond knew this, and it added fuel to her bitterness.

"I know my life will be harder for what I have said." Ah, Grace was right there; it would be long before her mother would forgive her for all those words, true as they were; and yet in her heart she had never so feared and admired her daughter. Grace went up to her own room, where Dottie was asleep in a little bed very near her sister's: it was dark and somewhat cold, but the atmosphere was less frigid than the parlor downstairs. Grace's frame was trembling with the force of her emotion; her face was burning, and her hands cold. It was restful and soothing to put down her aching head on the hard window-ledge and close her eyes and think out the pain! It seemed hours before Isabel came to summon her to supper, but she made an excuse that she was not hungry, and refused to go downstairs.

"But you ate nothing at tea, and your head is aching!" persisted Isabel, who was a bright, good-natured girl, and, in spite of Archie's strictures, decidedly pretty. "Do let me bring you something. Mother will not know."

But Grace refused: she could not eat, and the sight of food would distress her.

"Why not go to bed at once, then?" suggested Isabel,—which was certainly sensible counsel. But Grace demurred to this; she knew Archie would be up presently to say good-night to her: so, when Isabel had gone, she lighted the candle, shading it carefully from Dottie's eyes, and then she bathed her hot face, and smoothed her hair, and took up her work again.

Archie found her quite calm and busy, but he was not so easily deceived.

"Now, Gracie, you have got one of your headaches: it is the disappointment and the bother, and my going away to-morrow. Poor little Gracie!"

"Oh, Archie, I feel as though I shall never miss you so much!" exclaimed the poor girl, throwing down her work and clinging to him. "When shall I see your dear face again?—not until Christmas?"

"And not then, I expect. I shall most likely run down some time in January, and then I shall try hard to take you back with me, just for a visit. Mattie will be dull, and wanting to see some of you, and I will not have one of the others until you have been."

"I don't believe mother will spare me even for that," returned Grace, with a sudden conviction that her mother's memory was retentive, and that she would be punished in that way for her sins of this evening; "but promise me, Archie, that you will come, if it be only for a few days."

"Oh, I will promise you that. I cannot last longer without seeing you, Grace!" And he stroked her soft hair as she still clung to him.

The next day Archibald bade his family good-bye: his manner had not changed toward his mother, and Mrs. Drummond thought his kiss decidedly cold.

"You will be good to Mattie, and try to make the poor girl happy; you will do at least as much as this," she said, detaining him as he was turning from her to see Grace.

"Oh, yes, I will be good to her," he returned, indifferently, "but I cannot promise that she will not find her life dull." And then he took Grace in his arms, and whispered to her to be patient, and that all would be well one day; and Mrs. Drummond, though she did not hear the whisper, saw the embrace and the long lingering look between the brother and sister, and pressed her thin lips together and went back to her parlor and mending-basket, feeling herself an unhappy mother, whose love was not requited by her children, and disposed to be harder than ever towards Grace, who had inflicted this pain on her.



CHAPTER XV.

A VAN IN THE BRAIDWOOD ROAD.

One bright July morning, Mattie Drummond walked rapidly up the Braidwood Road, and, unlatching the green door in the wall, let herself into the large square hall of the vicarage. This morning it looked invitingly cool, with its summer matting and big wicker-work chairs; but Mattie was in too great haste to linger; she only stopped to disencumber herself of the various parcels with which she was ladened, and then she knocked at the door of her brother's study, and, without waiting for the reluctant "Come in" that always answered her hasty rap, burst in upon him.

It was now three months since Mattie had entered upon her new duties, and it must be confessed that Archie's housekeeper had rather a hard time of it. As far as actual management went, Mattie fully justified her mother's eulogiums in her household arrangements: she was orderly and methodical,—far more so than Grace would have been in her place; the meals were always punctual and well served, the domestic machinery worked well and smoothly. Archie never had to complain of a missing button or a frayed wrist-band. Nevertheless, Mattie's presence at the vicarage was felt by her brother as a sore burden. There was nothing in common between them, nothing that he cared to discuss with her, or on which he wished to know her opinion; he was naturally a frank, outspoken man, one that demanded sympathy from those belonging to him; but with Mattie he was reticent, and as far as possible restrained in speech.

One reason for this might be that Mattie, with all her virtues,—and she was really a most estimable little person,—was sadly deficient in tact. She never knew when she was treading on other people's pet prejudices. She could not be made to understand that her presence was not always wanted, and that it was as well to keep silence sometimes.