he turned, thinking to steal quietly away.

"You see, Auntie, I went out to try an' find a fortune for you," Small
Porges was explaining, "an' I looked, an' looked, but I didn't find
a bit--"

"My dear, dear, brave Georgy!" said Anthea, and would have kissed him
again, but he put her off:

"Wait a minute, please Auntie," he said excitedly, "'cause I did
find--something,--just as I was growing very tired an' disappointed, I
found Uncle Porges--under a hedge, you know."

"Uncle Porges!" said Anthea, starting, "Oh! that must be the man Mr.
Cassilis mentioned--"

"So I brought him with me," pursued Small Porges, "an' there he is!" and
he pointed triumphantly towards "King Arthur."

Glancing thither, Anthea beheld a tall, dusty figure moving off among
the trees.

"Oh,--wait, please!" she called, rising to her feet, and, with Small
Porges' hand in hers, approached Bellew who had stopped with his dusty
back to them.

"I--I want to thank you for--taking care of my nephew. If you will come
up to the house cook shall give you a good meal, and, if you are in need
of work, I--I--" her voice faltered uncertainly, and she stopped.

"Thank you!" said Bellew, turning and lifting his hat.

"Oh!--I beg your pardon!" said Anthea.

Now as their eyes met, it seemed to Bellew as though he had lived all
his life in expectation of this moment, and he knew that all his life he
should never forget this moment. But now, even while he looked at her,
he saw her cheeks flush painfully, and her dark eyes grow troubled.

"I beg your pardon!" said she again, "I--I thought--Mr. Cassilis gave me
to understand that you were--"

"A very dusty, hungry-looking fellow, perhaps," smiled Bellew, "and he
was quite right, you know; the dust you can see for yourself, but the
hunger you must take my word for. As for the work, I assure you exercise
is precisely what I am looking for."

"But--" said Anthea, and stopped, and tapped the grass nervously with
her foot, and twisted one of her bonnet-strings, and meeting Bellew's
steady gaze, flushed again, "but you--you are--"

"My Uncle Porges," her nephew chimed in, "an' I brought him home with me
'cause he's going to help me to find a fortune, an' he hasn't got any
place to go to 'cause his home's far, far beyond the 'bounding
billow,'--so you will let him stay, won't you, Auntie Anthea?"

"Why--Georgy--" she began, but seeing her distressed look, Bellew came
to her rescue.

"Pray do, Miss Anthea,