one.

"Not for a while. I shall often think of this place and this day," he
said, gazing off over the sea. "Ye're a comfortable cricket, when ye
want to be. I'd like to capture ye, to sing on my hearth!"

[Illustration: _"Ye're a comfortable cricket, when ye want to be. I'd
like to capture ye, to sing on my hearth!"_]

She sprang up.

"Well, I'm not ready to settle yet, so your hearth must go bare."

"Like Mother Hubbard's cupboard! Where are ye hoppin' off to?"

"Hotel, for lunch."

"Is it time?"

She nodded. He fell in step beside her.

"Ye haven't missed Percy?"

"I wonder what Percy's mother wanted with him," she evaded.

"So does Percy's mother," he retorted.

She looked up at him.

"You didn't----?"

"I did, Cricket; I jumped a longer jump than you did," he boasted.

"Why, you old grasshopper!" she exploded.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Miss Watts found Isabelle more reasonable, more amenable than ever
before in their association, and as she had made some pleasant
acquaintances, she was thoroughly enjoying herself. She hoped their stay
would be long. In her reports to the Bryces she conscientiously
mentioned Isabelle's good behaviour and her improvement in health.

She watched the career of her charge with interest and some concern. She
saw with surprise that the girl had hit upon the only possible way of
intriguing the interest of a spoiled darling like Captain O'Leary. She
flitted like a will-o'-the-wisp before him.

Larry thought that their talk on the beach had established a new
relation, but he soon found that he could not rely on it. When she was
particularly annoying he reminded her how sweet she had been that day,
but all she could recall of it was that he had cut Percy out! If he
ignored her completely, suddenly she was like a soft little rabbit in
his hands, all heart-beat. She puzzled and annoyed him.

These were busy days for Isabelle. Percy and Jack were always under
foot. They furnished comic relief when her military intrigue threatened
to become serious. Then her "god-son," Jean Jacques Petard, who was
wounded and in a hospital, replied to her maternal solicitude with
prolonged and passionate devotion. Isabelle shared the treasure with
Agnes, who protested that none of her godsons wrote to her like that;
and she asked to have Jean back. Isabelle stoutly refused. A gift was a
gift. Agnes had given her Jean and she intended to keep him.

"But you