traps and began to secure them in a manner which gave Audrey no hope.
"I'm sorry to be doing up luggage for you to go away altogether,
Miss Audrey. We shall all miss you," she said kindly. "The house will
seem dreadfully dull and empty. I think you had better come down and have
something to eat, or the mistress will be worrying. She likes to be at
the station in good time."

Audrey hurried out of her room for the last time, without a backward
glance, for her heart was too full to talk.

Once out in the sunshine, though, and walking across the park with her
grandmother, some of her unhappiness lightened. It was all so familiar,
so exactly as it always was, so calm and unchanged, it seemed impossible
that she could be going away from it all for more than a very little
while. There were several things, too, that could not fail to cheer her.
In her rug-strap were two new umbrellas, one for herself and one for
Faith. Her own had a white handle, and Faith's a green one. In her trunk
was a new coat for Faith, and a present for each and all from granny,
while in the new dark-blue hand-bag that she carried was a dark-blue
purse, and in the purse were a half-crown for Faith, and a new shilling
each for Debby and Tom.

"To do what they like with," said granny, as she popped in the coins,
"but granny hopes that they will like to put them in their money-boxes."

On the platform, when they got there, they found Audrey's neat green trunk
and portmanteau, with the rug-strap lying on top, and a porter mounting
guard over them. Audrey was very proud of her luggage when she travelled,
it looked so neat and nice, all green alike, and all with her initials,
'A. M. C.', in white. Granny had bought it all for her when they went for
their first annual visit to Torquay. Her old boxes, which she had taken
with her from home, had been sent to a Jumble Sale.

They were, after all, so early for the train that the last few moments
were rather painfully long and trying for them both. Granny bespoke a
corner seat, and ordered a foot-Warmer, and they had walked the whole
length of the platform until granny, at last, was weary, and still the
train had not come. At last Mrs. Carlyle, in her anxiety to fill up the
time, even went to the bookstall and bought some magazines for Audrey to
take with her. She did not approve of magazines as a rule. Audrey did,
though, and was overjoyed at having them; but while she was trying to get
a peep a