y will be delighted when they see me."

"They will, indeed," returns Joyce stolidly. "And so you are really
going to take me with you. Oh, I am glad. I haven't spent any of my
money this winter, Barbara; I have some, therefore, and I have always
wanted to see London."

"It will be a change for the children, too," says Barbara, with a
troubled sigh. "I suppose," to her husband, "they will think them very
countrified."

"Who?"

"Your mother--"

"What do you think of them?"

"Oh, that has got nothing to do with it."

"Everything rather. You are analyzing them. You are exalting an old
woman who has been unkind to you at the expense of the children who love
you!"

"Ah, she analyzes them because she too loves them," says Joyce. "It is
easy to pick faults in those who have a real hold upon our hearts. For
the rest--it doesn't concern us how the world regards them."

"It sounds as if it ought to read the other way round," says Monkton.

"No, no. To love is to see faults, not to be blind to them. The old
reading is wrong," says Joyce.

"You are unfair, Freddy," declares his wife with dignity; "I would not
decry the children. I am only a little nervous as to their reception.
When I know that your father and mother are prepared to receive them as
my children, I know they will get but little mercy at their hands."

"That speech isn't like you," says Monkton, "but it is impossible to
blame you for it."

"They are the dearest children in the world," says Joyce. "Don't think
of them. They must succeed. Let them alone to fight their own battles."

"You may certainly depend upon Tommy," says his father. "For any
emergency that calls for fists and heels, where battle, murder and
sudden death are to be looked for, Tommy will be all there."

"Oh! I do hope he will be good," says his mother, half amused, but
plainly half terrified as well.

* * * * *

Two weeks later sees them settled in town, in the Harley street house,
that seems enormous and unfriendly to Mrs. Monkton, but delightful to
Joyce and the children, who wander from room to room and, under her
guidance, pretend to find bears and lions and bogies in every corner.

The meeting between Barbara and Lady Monkton had not been satisfactory.
There had been very little said on either side, but the chill that lay
on the whole interview had never thawed for a moment.

Barbara had been stiff and cold, if entirely polite, but not at all