ed and kissed us--kindly but rather hurriedly--and then he put
us all into a cab, and left the servant who was with him to come after
with the luggage.

"It is better not to keep them waiting," he said to Pierson as we were
driving away.

"Your uncle is very kind and considering," said Pierson; she always said
"considering" for "considerate." "I wonder you spoke that way to him,
Miss Audrey."

"I didn't speak any way to him," I said crossly. "I don't see that it
was very kind to want to send me away from the boys. Mother told me I
was to take care of them, and I'm going to do what she told me."

"And I'm sure if you're going to teach them to get into naughty tempers
and to be so cross, they'd be better without you to take care of them,"
said Pierson.

That was her way; she always said something to make us more cross
instead of saying some little gentle thing to smooth us as mamma did.
Nobody ever made me so cross just in that kind of way as Pierson did. I
am sometimes quite ashamed when I remember it. Just then I did not
answer her again or say any more. I was too tired, and I felt that if I
said anything else I should begin to cry again, and I didn't want Mrs.
Partridge to see me with red eyes. Tom and Racey pressed themselves
close to me in the cab, and Tom whispered, "Never mind, Audrey.
Pierson's an ugly cross thing. We'll do what you tell us, always--won't
we, Racey?"

And Racey said "Yes, always," and then, poor little boys, they both
patted my hands and tried to comfort me. They always did like that when
Pierson was cross, and I don't think she much liked it, and I felt that
it was rather a pity to vex her when she had meant to be kind, but still
I didn't feel much inclined to make friends.

So we drove on--_what_ a long way it seemed! We had never been in London
before, and the streets and houses seemed as if they would never come to
an end. It was a very wet evening; I dare say it looked much less dull
and gloomy now than it had been earlier in the day, for the gas lighted
up the streets, and the shops looked bright and cheerful. I could not
but look at them with interest, what quantities there were, how nice it
would have been to come to London with mother, and to have gone about
buying lots of pretty things; but now it was quite different. And once
when I saw from the cab-window a poor, but neatly-dressed little girl
about my own size walking along by her mother, holding her hand and
looking quite ha