"Sooner or later," said little Aggie with serenity. "But why not?"

"Why not indeed?" he laughed. "It must be very plain sailing." Decidedly
she was, as Nanda had said, an angel, and there was a wonder in her
possession on this footing of one of the most expressive little faces
that even her expressive race had ever shown him. Formed to express
everything, it scarce expressed as yet even a consciousness. All the
elements of play were in it, but they had nothing to play with. It was a
rest moreover, after so much that he had lately been through, to be with
a person for whom questions were so simple. "But he sounds all the same
like the kind of doctor whom, as soon as one hears of him, one wants to
send for."

The young girl had at this a small light of confusion. "Oh I don't mean
he's a doctor for medicine. He's a clergyman--and my aunt says he's a
saint. I don't think you've many in England," little Aggie continued to
explain.

"Many saints? I'm afraid not. Your aunt's very happy to know one. We
should call Dr. Beltram in England a priest."

"Oh but he's English. And he knows everything we do--and everything we
think."

"'We'--your aunt, your governess and your nurse? What a varied wealth of
knowledge!"

"Ah Miss Merriman and Gelsomina tell him only what they like."

"And do you and the Duchess tell him what you DON'T like?"

"Oh often--but we always like HIM--no matter what we tell him. And we
know that just the same he always likes us."

"I see then of course," said Mr. Longdon, very gravely now, "what a
friend he must be. So it's after all this," he continued in a moment,
"that Nanda comes in?"

His companion had to consider, but suddenly she caught assistance. "This
one, I think, comes before." Lord Petherton, arriving apparently from
the garden, had drawn near unobserved by Mr. Longdon and the next moment
was within hail. "I see him very often," she continued--"oftener
than Nanda. Oh but THEN Nanda. And then," little Aggie wound up, "Mr.
Mitchy."

"Oh I'm glad HE comes in," Mr. Longdon returned, "though rather far down
in the list." Lord Petherton was now before them, there being no one
else on the terrace to speak to, and, with the odd look of an excess of
physical power that almost blocked the way, he seemed to give them in
the flare of his big teeth the benefit of a kind of brutal geniality.
It was always to be remembered for him that he could scarce show without
surprising you an adjustment to t