tern
princess! Perhaps I had better carry them myself if you are afraid of
me."

"I'm not afraid of you," said Jeffreys.

"But you are afraid of auntie. So am I--I hope she'll meet us. What
were you saying about the weather, Mr Jeffreys?"

Jeffreys glanced in alarm at his audacious companion. He had nothing
for it after this challenge but to walk with her and brave the
consequences. There was something in her half-mutinous, half-confiding
manner which rather interested him, and made the risk he was now running
rather exhilarating.

"Percy seems to have forsaken you," said she, after a pause, "since his
friends came. I suppose he is sure to be blowing his brains out or
something of the sort on the moors."

"Percy is a fine fellow, and certainly has some brains to blow,"
observed Jeffreys solemnly.

Raby laughed. "He's quite a reformed character since you came," said
she; "I'm jealous of you!"

"Why?"

"Oh, he cuts me, now he has you! He used about once a week to offer to
show me what he was doing. Now he only offers once a month, and then
always thinks better of it."

"The thing is to get him to work at one thing at a time," said Jeffreys,
to whom Percy was always an interesting study. "As soon as he has
learned that art he will do great things."

"I think Percy would make a fine soldier," said Raby, with an enthusiasm
which quite captivated her companion, "he's so brave and honest and
determined. Isn't he?"

"Yes, and clever too."

"Of course; but my father always says a man needn't be clever to be a
good soldier. He says the clever soldiers are the least valuable."

"Was your father a soldier?"

"Was? He is. He's in Afghanistan now."

"In the middle of all the fighting?"

"Yes," said Raby, with a shade across her bright face. "It's terrible,
isn't it? I half dread every time I see a letter or a newspaper. Mr
Jeffreys!" added the girl, stopping short in her walk, "my father is the
best and bravest man that ever lived."

"I know he is," said Jeffreys, beginning to wonder whether some of the
father's good qualities were not hereditary.

Raby looked up curiously and then laughed.

"You judge of him by seeing how heroic I am braving my aunt's wrath! Oh
dear, I do hope she meets us. It would be such a waste of courage if
she doesn't."

"I have benefited by your courage," said Jeffreys, quite staggered at
his own gallantry.

"I expect you're awfully dull in that old library," s