place?' asked Barbara, without moving.
All the mischief that was in her rose uppermost when any one spoke to her
like that.

'You are, of course,' returned Jean, shaking her again. 'You're so badly
brought up that you don't know how to behave in a civilised house. You're
nothing but a young savage; I heard Margaret Hulme say so, directly you
arrived--there! It's easy to see you've never had any one to look after
you.'

The mischievous look died out of the child's face, and she gathered up
her papers and scrambled slowly to her feet. The boys would have known
that such lamblike behaviour was only the prelude to one of the Babe's
'furies'; but Jean thought she had succeeded at last in subduing her, and
she became exultant.

'It's time that some one civilised you,' she remarked scornfully. 'I'm
glad I've been brought up properly, and not neglected like you.'

Barbara flashed round upon her suddenly. 'What's the matter with my
bringing-up?' she demanded in a breathless voice. 'My father brought
me up, and no one in the whole world could have brought me up better
than he has.'

'That accounts for it,' scoffed Jean. 'Fathers can't bring anybody up,
especially girls. I've heard mother say so, lots of times.'

Barbara's eyes were glittering brightly. 'My father can,' she answered
swiftly. 'My father isn't like other people's fathers. You shouldn't judge
my father by your father. I don't expect your father to be clever because
mine is, do I?'

The implied insult was quite accidental on her part, in spite of the anger
that was growing in her; but Jean could not be expected to know that.

'How dare you say that my father isn't clever?' she cried indignantly.
'My father is a professor at Edinburgh, so there!'

'My father writes books,' answered Babs, proudly. 'It's much more
wonderful to write books than to be a professor, because everybody all
over the world hears of you if you write books.'

'That depends on whether they're good books,' argued Jean, warmly. 'You
_have_ to be clever if you want to be a professor, but any stupid person
can write a stupid book, and nobody ever hears of that kind of book at
all.'

'Everybody has heard of my father's book, though, so that shows how little
you know about it,' replied Barbara. 'The people in America liked his book
so much that they asked him to go all the way to America to lecture about
it. The people in America never asked _your_ father----'

'Is your father called Evera