ked. "Tell Flora I am coming,
Mary."

"How did you know that Flora was a married lady?" asked Blanche, in her
would-be grown-up manner.

"I heard that from Aunt Flora. A famous lot of news I picked up there!"

"Aunt Flora!"

"Did you not know he had been at Auckland?" said Dr. May. "Aunt Flora
had to nurse him well after all he had undergone. Did you not think her
very like mamma, Harry?"

"Mamma never looked half so old!" cried Harry indignantly.

"Flora was five years younger!"

"She has got her voice and way with her," said Harry; "but you will soon
see. She is coming home soon."

There was a great outcry of delight.

"Yes, there is some money of Uncle Arnott's that must be looked after,
but he does not like the voyage, and can't leave his office, so perhaps
Aunt Flora may come alone. She had a great mind to come with me, but
there was no good berth for her in this schooner, and I could not wait
for another chance. I can't think what possessed the letters not to
come! She would not write by the first packet, because I was so ill, but
we both wrote by the next, and I made sure you had them, or I would have
written before I came."

The words were not out of his mouth before the second post was brought
in, and there were two letters from New Zealand! What would they not
have been yesterday? Harry would have burned his own, but the long
closely-written sheets were eagerly seized, as, affording the best hope
of understanding his adventures, as it had been written at intervals
from Auckland, and the papers, passing from one to the other, formed the
text for interrogations on further details, though much more was gleaned
incidentally in tete-a-tetes, by Margaret, Norman, or his father, and no
one person ever heard the whole connectedly from Harry himself.

"What was the first you knew of the fire, Harry?" asked Dr. May, looking
up from the letter.

"Owen shaking me awake; and I thought it was a hoax," said Harry. "But
it was true enough, and when we got on deck, there were clouds of smoke
coming up the main hatch-way."

Margaret's eyes were upon him, and her lips formed the question, "And
he?"

"He met us, and told us to be steady--but there was little need for
that! Every man there was as cool and collected as if it had been no
more than the cook's stove--and we should have scorned to be otherwise!
He put his hand on my shoulder and said, 'Keep by me,' and I did."

"Then there was never much hope of ext