ed to Brierley."

"Oh, this is not Brierley! but I am not comparing them. This is very
pretty, Mrs. Jersey! Why, Mrs. Jersey, you don't despise a daisy
because it isn't a rose!"

"No," said her friend; "but I suppose I cannot see the daisy when the
rose is by." She was looking at Dolly.

"Well," said Dolly, "the rose is not by; and I like this very much.
What a neat house! and what a pleasant sort of comfort there is about
everything. I would not have missed this, Mrs. Jersey, for a good deal."

"I am glad, Miss Dolly. I was thinking you were not taking much good of
your day's ride--the latter part."

Dolly was silent, looking out now somewhat soberly upon the smiling
scene; then she jumped up and threw off her gravity, and came to the
supper-table. It was spread with exquisite neatness, and appetising
nicety. Dolly found herself hungry. If but her errand to London had
been of a less serious and critical character, she could have greatly
enjoyed the adventure and its picturesque circumstances. With the
elastic strength of seventeen, however, she did enjoy it, even so.

"How good you are to me, Mrs. Jersey!" she said, after the table was
cleared and the two were sitting in the falling twilight. The still
peace outside and inside the house had found its way to Dolly's heart.
There was the brooding hush of the summer evening, marked, not broken,
by sounds of insects or lowing of cattle, and the voices of farm
servants attending to their work. It was yet bright outside, though the
sun had long gone down; inside the house shades were gathering.

"I wish I could be good to you, Miss Dolly," was the housekeeper's
answer.

"Oh, you are! I do not know what in the world I should have done, if
you had not let me go with you to London now."

"What can I do for you when we get there?"

"Oh, nothing! thank you."

"You know exactly where to go and what to do?"

"I shall take a cab and go--let me see,--yes, to father's rooms. If I
do not find him there, I must go to his office."

"In the City?"

"Yes. Will that be very far from your house? Why, yes, of course; we
shall be at the West End. Well, all the same, near or far, I must see
my father."

"You must be so good as to let me go in the cab with you," said Mrs.
Jersey. "I cannot let you drive all about London alone by yourself."

"Oh, thank you!" said Dolly again, with an undoubted accent of relief.
"But"----

That sentence remained unfinished. Dolly meditated. S