know Tom Kitterick, don't you?"

"The boy who cleans your boots? Yes, I do. A freckly faced brat."

"Exactly. Well, it appears that Miss Battersby is rather particular
about her complexion, and----"

"Lalage tried the stuff on Tom Kitterick, I suppose."

"Yes. She used the whole bottle, and Miss Battersby found out what had
happened and complained to me. She was extremely nice about it, but she
said that the incident had made her position as Lalage's governess quite
impossible."

"Lalage, of course, smiled balmily."

"Calmly," said the Canon. "She told me herself that the word was calm,
though it looked rather like 'balm.' Anyhow, that was the last straw.
Miss Battersby goes next week. The Archdeacon----"

"I thought he'd come in before we'd done."

"He did his best to be sympathetic and helpful. He said yesterday, just
before he went to Dublin, that what Lalage requires is a firm hand over
her. That's the sort of thing a bachelor with no children of his own
does say, and means of course. Any man who had ever tried to bring up
a girl would know that firm hands are totally useless, and, besides, I
haven't got any. '_Non sum qualis eram bonae sub regno...._' Don't try to
translate that if you'd rather not. It simply means that I'm not the man
I used to be. I hate trying to cope with these domestic broils. That's
why I'm going up to see your mother."

The drawn sword did not really interfere with the Canon's appetite, but
he refused to smoke a cigar after luncheon. I went off by myself to the
library. He followed my mother into the drawing-room. I waited, although
I had a good many things to do, until he joined me. He sighed heavily as
he sat down.

"Lalage is to go to school after summer," he said.

"My mother," I replied with conviction, "is sure to be right about a
matter like that."

"I suppose she is; but Lalage won't like it."

The Canon sighed again, heavily. I tried to cheer him up.

"She'll enjoy the companionship of the other girls," I said. "I daresay
she won't have a bad time. After all, a girl of fourteen ought to have
friends of her own age. It will be far better for her to be running
about with a skipping rope in a crowd of other damsels than to be
climbing chestnut trees and writing parodies in lonely pigstys."

"That's very much what your mother said. I wish I could think so. I'm
dreadfully afraid that, brought up as she has been, she'll have a bad
time of it."

"Anyhow, she won't have