ght, nohow. Sit you down again. Now I'm
here, I have something to say. I'll speak first to Mr. Frenchman. Listen
to this, old sir. If I happen to want a witness standing in the doorway,
I'll ring the bell; for the present I can do without you. Bong Shewer,
as we say in your country." He proceeded to shut the door on Toff and
his remonstrances.

"I protest, sir, against acts of violence, unworthy of a gentleman!"
cried Toff, struggling to get back again.

"Be as angry as you please in the kitchen," Rufus answered, persisting
in closing the door; "I won't have a noise up here. If you know where
your master is, go and fetch him--and the sooner the better." He turned
back to Sally, and surveyed her for a while in terrible silence. She
was afraid to look at him; her eyes were on the book which she had been
reading when he came in. "You look to me," Rufus remarked, "as if you
had been settled here for a time. Never mind your book now; you can go
back to your reading after we've had a word or two together first." He
reached out his long arm, and pulled the book to his own side of the
table. Sally innocently silenced him for the second time. He opened the
book, and discovered--the New Testament.

"It's my lesson, if you please, sir. I'm to learn it where the pencil
mark is, before Amelius comes back." She offered her poor little
explanation, trembling with terror. In spite of himself, Rufus began to
look at her less sternly.

"So you call him 'Amelius', do you?" he said. "I note that, Miss, as an
unfavourable sign to begin with. How long, if you please, has Amelius
turned schoolmarm, for your young ladyship's benefit? Don't you
understand? Well, you're not the only inhabitant of Great Britain who
don't understand the English language. I'll put it plainer. When I last
saw Amelius, you were learning your lessons at the Home. What ill wind,
Miss, blew you in here? Did Amelius fetch you, or did you come of your
own accord, without waiting to be whistled for?" He spoke coarsely but
not ill-humouredly. Sally's pretty downcast face was pleading with him
for mercy, and (as he felt, with supreme contempt for himself) was not
altogether pleading in vain. "If I guessed that you ran away from the
home," he resumed, "should I guess right?"

She answered with a sudden accession of confidence. "Don't blame
Amelius," she said; "I did run away. I couldn't live without him."

"You don't know how you can live, young one, till you've tried t