Eva will think we
have deserted her."

They found Eva slightly truculent.

"I was wonderin' was you stayin' over there to dinner," she said. "I
know I ain't one of your fine lady cooks with a nime out of the
'Family 'Erald,' but there ain't no 'arm in that there potato pie, for
all that!"

"It looks beautiful," said Norah, regarding the brown pie
affectionately. "I'm so glad I'm here for lunch. What does Michael
have, Eva?"

"Michael 'as fish--an' 'e 'as it out in the kitchen with me," said Eva
firmly. "An' 'is own little baby custid-puddin'. No one but me ever
cooks anythink for that kid. Well, of course, you send 'im cakes an'
things," she added grudgingly.

"Oh, but they're not nourishment," said Norah with tact.

"No," said Eva brightening. "That's wot I says. An' nourishment is
wot counts, ain't it?"

"Oh, rather!" Norah said. "And isn't he a credit to you! Well, come
on, children--I want pie!" She drew Alison's high chair to the table,
while Eva, departing to the kitchen, relieved her feelings with a
burst of song.

They spent a merry afternoon at the river--a little stream which went
gurgling over pebbly shallows, widening now and then into a broad
pool, or hurrying over miniature rapids where brown trout lurked.
Harry and Bob, like most Australian soldiers in England, were
themselves only children when they had the chance of playing with
babies; they romped in the grass with them, swung them on low-growing
boughs, or skimmed stones across placid pools, until the sun grew low
in the west, and they came back across the park. Norah wheeled
Michael in a tiny car; Bob carried Alison, and presently Geoffrey
admitted that his legs were tired, and was glad to ride home astride
Harry's broad shoulders. Mr. Linton came out to meet them, and they
all went back to the cottage, where Eva had tea ready and was slightly
aggrieved because her scones had cooled.

"Now, you must all go home," Norah told her men-folk, after tea.
"It's late, and I have to bath three people."

"Don't we see you again?" Harry asked.

"You may come over to-night if you like--Dad is coming," Norah said.
"Geoff, you haven't finished, have you?"

"I don't think I'm very hungry," Geoffrey said. "May I go and shut up
my guinea-pigs?"

"Yes, of course. Alison darling, I don't think you ought to have any
more cakes."

"I always has free-four-'leven when mother is at home," said Alison
firmly, annexing a chocolate cake and