he blackness by the
fireplace where the dead mouse had been, put out her hand to touch its
cold fur.

* * * * *

There were wheels on the gravel outside--the knocker swung
strongly--'_Rat_-tat-tat-tat--_Tat_! _Tat_!' A pause--voices--hasty feet
in strong boots sounded on the stairs, the key turned in the lock. The
door opened a dazzling crack, then fully, to the glare of a lamp
carried by Mrs. Staines.

'Come down at once. I'm sure you're good now,' she said, in a great
hurry and in a new honeyed voice.

But there were other feet on the stairs--a step that Elsie knew.
'Where's my girl?' the voice she knew cried cheerfully. But under the
cheerfulness Elsie heard something other and dearer. 'Where's my girl?'

After all, it takes less than a month to come from India to the house in
England where one's heart is.

Out of the bare attic and the darkness Elsie leapt into light, into arms
she knew. 'Oh, my daddy, my daddy!' she cried. 'How glad I am I came
back!'

IX

THE RELATED MUFF

We had never seen our cousin Sidney till that Christmas Eve, and we
didn't want to see him then, and we didn't like him when we did see
him. He was just dumped down into the middle of us by mother, at a time
when it would have been unkind to her to say how little we wanted him.

We knew already that there wasn't to be any proper Christmas for us,
because Aunt Ellie--the one who always used to send the necklaces and
carved things from India, and remembered everybody's birthday--had come
home ill. Very ill she was, at a hotel in London, and mother had to go
to her, and, of course, father was away with his ship.

And then after we had said good-bye to mother, and told her how sorry we
were, we were left to ourselves, and told each other what a shame it
was, and no presents or anything. And then mother came suddenly back in
a cab, and we all shouted 'Hooray' when we saw the cab stop, and her get
out of it. And then we saw she was getting something out of the cab, and
our hearts leapt up like the man's in the piece of school poetry when he
beheld a rainbow in the sky--because we thought she had remembered about
the presents, and the thing she was getting out of the cab was _them_.

Of course it was not--it was Sidney, very thin and yellow, and looking
as sullen as a pig.

We opened the front door. Mother didn't even come in. She just said,
'Here's your Cousin Sidney. Be nice to him and give him