r speak of your part of it, or think of it even. As long as papa and
mamma are all right--and I'm sure they are--you may count it a case of
all's well that ends well.'

I did begin to feel rather cheered up.

'You're sure I'm not going to get a talking to, after all?' I said,
still doubtfully. 'I saw mamma looking at me rather funnily in the
train.'

'Did you, my boy?' said another voice, and glancing round, I saw mamma,
who had come into the room so quietly that neither of us had heard her.

She sat down beside us. And then it was that she explained to me what I
had done wrong, and been foolish about. I have already told what she
said, and I felt that it was all true and sensible. And she was so
kind--not laughing at me a bit, even for having a little believed about
the witch and all that--that I lost the horrid, mortified, ashamed
feelings I had been having.

Just then the nursery tea-bell rang. I got up--slowly--I still felt a
little funny and uncomfortable about Blanche, and even nurse. You see
nurse made such a pet of Peterkin that she never scarcely could see that
he should be found fault with, and of course he was a very good little
chap, though not exactly an angel without wings--and certainly rather a
queer child, with all his fairy-tale fancies.

But mamma put her hand on my arm.

'No,' she said. 'Clem and you are going to have tea in the drawing-room
with me. The nursery party will be better left to itself to-day, and
little Margaret is not accustomed to so many.'

'I don't believe anything would make her feel shy, though,' I said. 'She
is just as funny in her way as Peterkin in his. And, mamma, there are
some things I don't understand still. Is there any sort of mystery? Why
did Mrs. Wylie leave off talking about Margaret, and you too, I think,
all of a sudden? I'm sure it was Mrs. Wylie's way of pinching up her
lips about her, that made Pete surer than ever about the enchantment and
the parrot and the witch and everything.'

Mamma smiled.

'No,' she said, 'there is no mystery at all. I will explain about it
while we are having tea. It must be ready for us.'

And she went into the drawing-room, Clement and I following her. It
looked so nice and comfortable--I was jolly glad, I know, to be at home
again!

Then mamma told us--or me; I think Clem had heard it already--about
Margaret.

Her father and mother were in India, as I have said, have I not? And her
grandfather was taking care of her. He