cing down at the ground,
but the people about him were too many to reveal at what he looked.
Whether he caught sight of Denys and Pattie, and could not face
speaking to them, or whether he never even saw them, Denys could not
tell, but as they neared him, he stopped suddenly and looked into a
shop window, showing the baby something that made it shout and crow
with delight; but in one instant Denys forgot everything else in the
world, but the strangeness of another sight that met her eyes.

She stood stock still in the centre of the pavement, gazing at a
figure that was coming towards her.

The figure of a little, little girl, walking alone among the crowd,
yet not of it. A little girl with brown, fluffy curls, turning to gold
at the roots, crowned by a big white sailor hat with a black ribbon
round it--a little girl dressed in a short black frock with a kilt and
a sailor jacket; a little girl so like--ah! how many children had she
seen lately so like little Maud! Then the child's blue eyes met hers,
and, with a scream, Denys had sprung forward, and Maud--little lost
Maud--was in her arms.

* * * * *

When Denys began once more to realise anything beyond the pressure of
her arms round their lost treasure, she became conscious that a little
crowd had gathered, and that Pattie was hurriedly explaining what
had happened, and there was pity and sympathy in the listening faces
around, so that Denys thought wonderingly how kind the world was.

"A cab!" she said, and she lifted her head as if she were but just
awakened from a long and horrible dream. Oh! how glad she was to have
Pattie with her!

With Maud still clasped in her arms, she and Pattie got into the
cab, and as it rumbled off to the station, the little crowd that had
gathered, thinned away and scattered, and Jim Adams and his baby went
with it.

Jim had been to the Nursery to fetch the two children. It was upon
little Maud, running beside him, that he had constantly glanced down.
When he stopped to look into the shop window she had not observed it,
but had trotted on among the crowd, and he, turning to see what had
become of her, had seen the meeting between her and Denys. Thinking
simply that the child knew Denys and loved her, as Harry did, he had
drawn near to claim her, and had heard Pattie's hurried explanation,
and hearing it, he had drawn further and further to the edge of the
crowd.

But Maud had been too far from him