anions."

Dreda threw out her arms with a gesture of despair, but she made no
further protest. Difficulties arising in the dim future she felt
herself able to face resolutely enough, but the thought that they might
begin that very afternoon dispelled her ardour. She listened to Miss
Drake's further utterances with so quelled and dispirited an air that
that quick-sighted lady felt that enough had been said for the moment,
and calling her elder pupils to her side, set the two younger girls free
to walk together.

It was the moment for which both had been longing, but a mutual shyness
held them tongue-tied for the first hundred yards. Naturally it was
Dreda who broke the silence.

"It was ripping of you to offer to coach me. I don't believe in
learning all those things, but if I must, I must, and it would have been
difficult all alone. I hope you don't mind."

"I want to," said Susan simply. "I've always wanted to do something for
you, since the first time we met. It was at a Christmas party at the
Rectory and you wore a black frock. I never thought then that you would
come to school with us, but I wished you could be my friend. When I've
made castles in the air they have always been about you, and something
we could do together. I sat beside you at supper. Do you remember?"

No! Dreda had no recollection of the kind. She and her brothers and
sisters had always cherished a secret contempt for the Webster sisters
and had sedulously avoided them on every occasion. If Susan had been
seated on one side at supper, it followed as a matter of course that
Dreda herself had devoted her attention exclusively to whoever sat at
the other side. She felt a faint pricking of conscience, and answered
tentatively: "It is so long ago. I have a wretched memory. I remember
we had lovely crackers at supper--but that's all. How did you come to
notice me?"

"Because you were so pretty," Susan said. "Your sister is pretty too,
very pretty, but she does not look so gay. And your brothers--they are
such big, handsome boys. You are all handsome, and big, and strong, and
have such romantic names. You seemed far more like a family in a book
than real, live people. The `Story-Book Saxons'--that was always our
name for you when we spoke of you between ourselves. Do you think it is
nice?"

"Very nice, indeed. `Story-Book Saxons!' I must tell Rowena that."
Dreda preened her head complacently. This simple admiration was m