told us
plenty about your horrid old house; don't tell us any more."

"There isn't any more to tell," says Dicky, who is quite content with
his success so far.

"You haven't yet told us where you were all day," says Portia, lowering
her fan to look at him.

"In the village for the most part--I dote on the village--interviewing
the school and the children. Mr. Redmond got hold of me, and took me in
to see the infants. It was your class I saw, I think, Dulce; it was so
uncommonly badly behaved."

Dulce, in her dark corner, gives no sign that she has heard this
gracious speech.

"I don't think much of your schoolmaster either," goes on Mr. Browne,
unabashed. "His French, I should say, is not his strong point. Perhaps
he speaks it 'after the scole of Stratford-atte-Bowe,' for certainly
'Frenche of Paris, is to him unknowe?'"

"I shouldn't think one would look for foreign languages from a village
schoolmaster," says Sir Mark, lazily.

"I _didn't_ look for it, my good fellow, he absolutely showered it upon
me; and in the oddest fashion. I confess I didn't understand him. He has
evidently a trick of coloring his conversation with fine words--a trick
beyond me."

"What did he say to you, Dicky?" asks Julia, whose curiosity is excited.

"He told me a story," says Mr. Browne; "I'll tell it again to you now,
if you like, but I don't suppose you _will_ like, because, as I said
before, I don't understand it myself. It was hardly a story either, it
was more a diatribe about his assistant."

"Peter Greene?"

"Ye--es. This objectionable young man's name was Peter, though, if the
the schoolmaster is to be believed, he isn't _green_. 'Sir,' said he to
me, 'that Peter is a bad lot--no worse. He can teach the Latin, and the
Greek, and the astronomy, fust-class; but as for probity or truth, or
honest dealin's of any sort, he is _au revoir_!' What on earth did he
mean?" says Mr. Browne, turning a face, bright with innocence, upon the
group that surrounds the fire.

"To-morrow will be Christmas Day," says the Boodie, suddenly. She is
lying, as usual, full length upon the hearth-rug, with her chin sunk
between both her palms, and her eyes fixed upon the fire. This remark
she addresses apparently to a glowing cinder. "I wonder if I shall get
many presents," she says, "and if they will be things to _love_."

"How sweet it is to study the simplicity, the lack of mercenary thought
in the little child," says Dicky, regarding her w