que, although perhaps
he did not mean it to be so.

"Oh, please, do!" she pleaded. "Because then I shall not feel so
worried, and I am sure that Rupert will not take much harm for half an
hour, while you will feel far more fit when you have had a meal."

"It is very kind of you to be so insistent, and I really am very
hungry," he replied, smiling broadly now, for the supper which Sylvia
had cooked for him from their own stores smelled exceedingly good, and
she was already pouring a cup of tea out for him and doing her very best
to make him feel how grateful they were to him for all his kindness to
Rupert.

"But won't you sit down and have something to eat also?" he asked, as
she hovered about ready to anticipate his wants.

"No, thank you, we had supper before you came, when we were waiting for
Father," she said, with a choke in her voice, which made her turn
hastily away and knock a tin pan over, so that in the sudden clatter he
might not notice how near she was to booing like a baby.

He frowned heavily, as he wondered what the guardians of this family
could have been thinking of not to write and make sure that the father
was in a position to receive them, before sending seven irresponsible
young people halfway round the world, on the off chance of finding their
father when they reached the end of the journey.

"It has really been very hard for you, and we must do our best to help
you out of the muddle," he said quite kindly, as he enjoyed the results
of Sylvia's handiwork and began to feel all the better for his supper.

"Do you know where Father has gone?" she asked, putting the question
which Nealie lacked the courage to ask.

"When Dr. Plumstead passed the practice over to me, eighteen months ago,
he said that he was going to Mostyn, and that letters from England were
to be forwarded to the Post Office there, but that nothing else was to
be sent on," the doctor answered.

"If your name is the same as Father's, how would you know which were
your letters and which were his?" Sylvia asked in a wondering tone, for
to her it seemed of all things most strange that there should be two
doctors of one name, and that not a common one, in a small town like
Hammerville.

"Oh, that was easy enough! I am an Australian, educated in Germany, and
I have not a single correspondent in England. But only one letter has
come for your father, and that arrived about two weeks ago, so I
forwarded it to Mostyn at once," said th