ese children have
driven you to desperation."

"That will be never," declares Amy, giving a final kiss to the
exhausted Billy. "We like her far too much, and always will, I know,
because nothing on earth could make me afraid of her!"

At this they all laugh. Georgie, I think, blushes a little; but even
the thought that she is not exactly all she ought to be as an orthodox
governess cannot control her sense of the ludicrous.

"Cissy, when is your father's concert to come off?" asks Clarissa,
presently.

"At once, I think. The old organ is unendurable. I do hope it will be
a success, as he has set his heart on getting a new one. But it is so
hard to make people attend. They will pay for their tickets, but they
won't come. And, after all, what the--the _others_ like, is to see the
county."

"Get Dorian Branscombe to help you. Nobody ever refuses him anything."

"Who is Dorian Branscombe?" asks Georgie, indifferently, more from
want of something to say than an actual desire to know.

"Dorian?" repeats Clarissa, as though surprised; and then, correcting
herself with a start, "I thought every one knew Dorian. But I forgot,
you are a stranger. He is a great friend of mine; he lives near this,
and you must like him."

"Every one likes him," says Cissy, cordially.

"Lucky he," says Georgie. "Is he your lover, Clarissa?"

"Oh, no,"--with a soft blush, born of the thought that if he is not
the rose he is very near to it. "He is only my friend, and a nephew of
Lord Sartoris."

"So great as that?"--with a faint grimace. "You crush me. I suppose he
will hardly deign to look at _me_?"

As she speaks see looks at herself in an opposite mirror, and smiles a
small coquettish smile that is full of innocent childish satisfaction,
as she marks the fair vision that is given back to her by the friendly
glass.

"I hope he won't look at you too much, for his own peace of mind,"
says Cissy, at which Clarissa laughs again; and then, the children
getting impatient, they all go out to see the pigeons and the gardens,
and stay lingering in the open air until afternoon tea is announced.

CHAPTER XIV.

"Where music dwells
Lingering, and wandering on, as loath to die,
Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof
That they were born for immortality."--WORDSWORTH.

The parish church of Pullingham is as naught in the eyes of the
parishioners, in that it is devoid of an organ. No sweet soun