s without a word, covered my face with
kisses. I knew he was crying, because my cheeks were instantly wet with
his tears; but it was too dark for me to see who he was, or even how he
was dressed. He did not, I should think, hold me half a minute in his
arms. The housemaid screamed for help. I was put down gently on the
sand, and the strange man instantly disappeared in the darkness.

When this extraordinary adventure was related to my aunt, she seemed
at first merely bewildered at hearing of it; but in a moment more there
came a change over her face, as if she had suddenly recollected or
thought of something. She turned deadly pale, and said, in a hurried
way, very unusual with her:

"Never mind; don't talk about it any more. It was only a mischievous
trick to frighten you, I dare say. Forget all about it, my dear--forget
all about it."

It was easier to give this advice than to make me follow it. For many
nights after, I thought of nothing but the strange man who had kissed me
and cried over me.

Who could he be? Somebody who loved me very much, and who was very
sorry. My childish logic carried me to that length. But when I tried to
think over all the grown-up gentlemen who loved me very much, I could
never get on, to my own satisfaction, beyond my father and my Uncle
George.

CHAPTER II.

I was taken home on the appointed day to suffer the trial--a hard one
even at my tender years--of witnessing my mother's passionate grief and
my father's mute despair. I remember that the scene of our first meeting
after Caroline's death was wisely and considerately shortened by my
aunt, who took me out of the room. She seemed to have a confused desire
to keep me from leaving her after the door had closed behind us; but I
broke away and ran downstairs to the surgery, to go and cry for my lost
playmate with the sharer of all our games, Uncle George.

I opened the surgery door and could see nobody. I dried my tears and
looked all round the room--it was empty. I ran upstairs again to Uncle
George's garret bedroom--he was not there; his cheap hairbrush and old
cast-off razor-case that had belonged to my grandfather were not on the
dressing-table. Had he got some other bedroom? I went out on the landing
and called softly, with an unaccountable terror and sinking at my heart:

"Uncle George!"

Nobody answered; but my aunt came hastily up the garret stairs.

"Hush!" she said. "You must never call that name out here again!"