ther nice,' said Dolly, turning round from where
she knelt on the hearthrug. 'Wake up, Frisk, and be good-tempered
directly. Mother, on Christmas Day I'm going to tie a Christmas card
round Frisk's neck, and send him into papa's dressing-room to wish him
a Merry Christmas, the first thing in the morning--you won't tell him
before the time, will you?'

'Not if you don't wish it, darling,' said Mrs. Langton, placidly.

'I mightn't have had him to tie a card to,' said Dolly, taking the dog
up and hugging him fondly, 'if that gentleman had not fetched him out
of the train for me; and I never said "thank you" to him either. I
forgot somehow, and when I remembered he was gone. Should you think he
will come to see me, Mabel; you told him that mother would be glad to
thank him some time, didn't you, on the paper you gave the guard for
him?'

'Yes, Dolly,' said Mabel, turning her head a little away; 'but you see
he hasn't come yet.'

'My dear,' said her mother, 'really I think he shows better taste in
keeping away; there was no necessity to send him a message at all, and
I hope he won't take any advantage of it. Thanking people is so
tiresome and, after all, they never think you have said enough about
it. It was very kind of the young man, of course, very--though I can't
say I ever quite understood what it was he did--it was something in a
fog, I know,' she concluded vaguely.

'We told you all about it, mother,' explained Dolly; 'I'll tell you
all over again. There was a fog and our train stopped, and we all got
out, and I left Frisk behind, and there he was in the carriage all
alone, and then the gentleman ran back and got him out and brought him
to me. And another train came up behind and stopped too.'

'Dolly tells it rather tamely,' said Mabel, her cheeks flushing again.
'At the time he ran back for the dog, we could all hear the other
train rushing up in the fog, mamma, and nobody knew whether there
might not be a frightful collision in another minute.'

'Then I think it was an extremely rash thing for him to do, my dear;
and if I were his mother I should be very angry with him.'

'He was very good-looking, wasn't he, Mabel?' said Dolly,
irrelevantly.

'Was he, Dolly? Well, yes, I suppose he was, rather,' said Mabel, with
much outward indifference, and an inward and very vivid picture of
Mark's face as he leaned by the stile, his fine eyes imploring her not
to leave him.

'Well, perhaps, he doesn't care about b