side when he awoke.

"You've had a close shave, my lad!" he said, in his quick, direct way.
"You'll pull through now though.--Plenty of nourishment and perfect
rest, that's all he wants in the meantime," added the doctor to Miss
Turner, as he hurried off to visit another patient, or perhaps to have a
little chat with Miss Alice, who was amusing Darby in the garden, where
the bees buzzed and worked about their hives along the sunny south wall.

After seeing the doctor down the stairs Miss Turner came back to the
dwarf, and as she entered the room she saw him turn his face away from
the window to the wall with a sigh, which filled her heart with pity for
the forlorn little being.

"Now, Bambo," she began, "you have done so much for me and mine that I
want you to let me be as kind to you as I know how. You have been more
than a friend to my dear nephew's children. I desire above all things to
be a friend to you."

"O ma'am, that is impossible," answered the dwarf in a choked voice.
"You are a lady, while I am nobody--an insignificant, despised object!
And don't you know who I really am? Green, your gardener's
grandson--Jimmy Green the dwarf, the boy who ran away from Firgrove long
ago, when you and Miss Alice were in foreign parts for your eddication!"

"I believe my sister and I were in Paris at that time," answered Miss
Turner lightly. "But what difference does the fact of your being Green's
grandson make, except to give you an additional claim upon our
friendliness? And, Bambo, your grandfather is truly sorry he treated you
harshly and unjustly in the past. He has asked me to tell you so, and to
say that instead of feeling ashamed of you now, he's really proud to
think what you have done for Master Darby and Miss Joan."

"'Twas nothing, nothing," murmured the dwarf in confusion, although his
beaming face plainly showed the gratification he felt at his
grandfather's message.

"And now," resumed Miss Turner, "if I am to be your friend, you must
tell me why you sighed so sadly just now. Come; you won't refuse, I am
sure," she added in a persuasive tone.

For a while there was silence in the room. Miss Turner waited for the
dwarf to speak. He kept his face towards the wall, and from time to time
put up a long, thin hand to wipe away the big tears that forced their
way beneath his closed eyelids to trickle slowly on to the snowy pillow
in which his head was half hidden.

At length he raised himself in the bed and l