post it was nearly
dinner-time.

How the beck did roar that afternoon. And when the children looked out
from the drawing-room window they could see a little flood on the lawn,
where the water had come over the side of the stream. While they were
having their tea, with mother sitting by, working and chattering to
them, they heard a knock at the door, and when they opened it there was
father standing in the unused kitchen, with the water running off his
waterproof coat, making little streams all over the stone floor.

"I have been down to look at the river," he said to Mrs. Norton. "Keep
off, children! I'm much too wet to touch. Such rain! It does know how
to come down here! The water's over the road just by the
stepping-stones. John Backhouse says if it goes on another twenty-four
hours like this, there'll be no getting to Wanwick by the road, on
foot."

"Father," said Milly, looking at him with a very solemn face, "wouldn't
it be dreadful if it went on raining and raining, and if the river came
up and up, right up to the drive and into the hall, and we all had to
sit upstairs, and the butcher couldn't bring us any meat, and John
Backhouse couldn't bring us any milk, and we all _died_ of hunger."

"Then they would put us into some black boxes," said Olly, cheerfully,
with his mouth full of bread and butter, "and they would put the black
boxes into some boats, and take us right away and bury us
krick--wouldn't they, mother?"

"Well, but--" said Mr. Norton, who had by this time got rid of his wet
coat, and was seated by Milly, helping himself to some tea, "suppose we
got into the boats before we were dead, and rowed away to Windermere
station?"

"Oh no! father," said Milly, who always liked her stories to be as
gloomy as possible, "they wouldn't know anything about us till we were
dead you know, and then they'd come and find us, and be _very_ sorry for
us, and say, 'Oh dear! oh dear! what a pity!'"

Olly began to look so dismal as Milly's fancies grew more and more
melancholy, that Mrs. Norton took to laughing at them all. What did they
know about Westmoreland rain indeed. This was nothing--just nothing at
all; she _could_ remember some floods in the wintertime, when she was a
little girl, and used to stay with Aunt Emma and great-grandmamma; but
as for this, why, it was a good summer wetting, and that was all.

A romp sent the children to bed in excellent spirits again. This time
both Milly and Olly stood at th