r so moved or so eloquent. I strove to reassure her.

"You are quite right, Mrs. Parrot. I apologize for any painful moments
my friends and I have given you. But don't worry too much about Susan.
So far as Susan's concerned, I promise to 'take cognizance' in every
possible direction."

It was clear to me that I should have to expend a good deal of care upon
engaging another housekeeper at once. And, of course, a governess--for
lessons and things. And a maid? Yes; Susan would need a maid, if only to
do her mending. Obviously, neither the housekeeper, the governess, nor I
could be expected to take cognizance of that.

II

But I anticipate. Two weeks before Mrs. Parrot's peroration, on the very
evening of the day Maltby Phar had left me, Susan and I had had our
first good talk together. My memorable shopping tour had not yet come
off, and Susan, having pecked birdlike at a very light supper, was
resting--semi-recumbent--in bed, clothed in a suit of canary-yellow
pajamas, two sizes too big for her, which I was rather shaken to
discover belonged to Nora, my quiet little Irish parlor maid. I had not
supposed that Nora indulged in night gear filched from musical comedy.
However, Nora had meant to be kind in a good cause; though canary yellow
is emphatically a color for the flushed and buxom and should never be
selected for peeny, anemic little girls. It did make Susan look middling
ghastly, as if quarantined from all access to Hygeia, the goddess!
Perhaps that is why, when I perched beside her on the edge of Gertrude's
colonial four-poster, I felt an unaccustomed prickling sensation back of
my eyes.

"How goes it, canary bird?" I asked, taking the thin, blue-threaded hand
that lay nearest to me.

Susan's fingers at once curled trustfully to mine, and there came
something very like a momentary glimmer of mischief into her dark eyes.

"If I was an honest-to-God canary, I could sing to you," said Susan.
"I'd like to do something for you, Mr. Hunt. Something you'd like, I
mean."

"Well, you can, dear. You can stop calling me 'Mr. Hunt'! My first
name's pretty awkward, though. It's Ambrose."

For an instant Susan considered my first name, critically, then very
slowly shook her head. "It's a nice name. It's _too_ nice, isn't it--for
every day?"

I laughed. "But it's all I have, Susan. What shall we do about it?"

Then Susan laughed, too; it was the first time I had heard her laugh. "I
guess your mother was feeling ki