lways an absorbing subject and, losing
herself in it, she became totally oblivious of her surroundings. Nearly
an hour later, she was roused by the sound of approaching voices, and
she straightened herself and peered down through the branches.

Just below her, on the other side of the fence, so close to it that it
had escaped her notice, was a light bamboo lounge, covered with a pile
of bright cushions. Across the garden, evidently towards it, came a
wheeled chair pushed by a sedate-looking person in green livery, and
occupied by a slight figure covered with a gay rug. Theodora gave a
little gasp of sheer delight.

"It's the boy!" she exclaimed to herself. "Now is my chance to get a
look at him."

Beside the lounge, the chair came to a halt, and the man, bending down,
lifted the boy from the chair. With pitiful eyes, Theodora noted the
limp helplessness of all the lower part of his body; but she also saw
that the boyish face was bright and manly, and that his blue eyes
flashed with a spirit equal to Hubert's own. She watched approvingly the
handy way in which the man settled the cushions. Then he turned to go
away. Half way across the garden, he was arrested by a call from the
lounge.

"Hi, Patrick!"

"Well, sir?"

"Where's my book?"

"What book?"

"The one I was reading, the blue one."

"I think you left it in the house."

"But didn't I tell you to bring it along? Go and get it, and hurry up
about it." And a pillow flew after Patrick's retreating form with a
strength and an accuracy of aim which called forth an ill-suppressed
giggle from Theodora.

Presently the man reappeared, book in hand, and the boy hailed him
jovially with an utter disregard of his passing ill-humor. Then the man
went away, and silence fell. The boy below was absorbed in his reading;
Theodora above in watching him and building up a detailed romance about
him, upon the slight foundation of her present impression.

"I wonder what his name is," she said to herself. "I hope it's something
nice and interesting, like Valentine, or Geoffrey, or something."

She had just reached the point in her romance where one of them, she was
not quite sure which, should rescue the other from a runaway horse, when
the boy suddenly called her back to the present by throwing his open
book on the ground, with a vigorous yawn.

"Ha-um!" he remarked, and, turning his head slightly, he stared
aimlessly up into the tree above him.

Theodora, high up amon