surprise and vexation, Blanche sat perfectly
unmoved before it, and did not lift a paw. Perhaps during her short
visit to the stable she had become acquainted with real mice, for after
giving one slight sniff at the imitation one, she rose and walked away
with a high and scornful step.

"Well, I'm sure!" exclaimed Philippa. She stood gazing at the kitten as
though she could hardly believe what she had seen, then turned and flung
herself moodily into the window-seat. Everything at Haughton, even the
kitten, was tiresome, and disagreeable, and dreadfully dull.

"You're not a bit of comfort," she said to Blanche, who was now mewing
at the door to be let out, "and if they send you to the stable again, I
shan't fetch you back. I believe you're just fit for a low, mean
stable-cat. So there!"

It was some relief to hurl this insult, but it hurt Philippa a great
deal more than the cat, and her eyes filled with tears as she turned her
head and looked out into the garden. Here again the contrast to
Fieldside struck her. Broad gravelled terraces, flights of stone steps,
masses of brilliant flower-beds; and beyond, the wide green spaces of
the park, with its groups of trees all standing in exactly the right
places, well ordered, stately, correct, as though the very shrubs and
plants had been trained to hold themselves with propriety.

At Fieldside you could not look for a minute out of the schoolroom
window without seeing something alive. Cows strolling across the
meadow; Aunt Katharine's chickens venturing into the garden, and driven
out by Peter, cackling and shrieking; companies of busy starlings
working away on the lawn; it was all lively and cheerful, though Mrs
Trevor always said it was "buried in the country." Haughton Park was
considered a "beautiful place," and Philippa was used to hearing it
spoken of as such, but just now she decided in her own mind that it was
not to be compared to Fieldside. As she sat gloomily gazing out of the
window, her eye was caught by something which she had not noticed
before, and which she began to observe with some interest. It was
nothing more remarkable than the figure of a boy in a ragged jacket, who
knelt on the garden path below, weeding. Philippa studied him
attentively.

He was small and thin, just about Dennis's age, and he was certainly
poor, for his clothes were old and shabby. Who was he? If he were a
boy in the garden at Fieldside, she went on to reflect, Dennis