rgaret, timidly, but still laughing in
spite of herself. "I--I saw you the other day, Mr. Merryweather. I
thought--you seemed to be enjoying yourself very much."

"No! Did you, though?" cried Gerald. "I say! Where was it? I never meant
to do it when people were round. I'm awfully sorry."

"Oh, no!" said Margaret, confused. "Why shouldn't you? It--it was by the
edge of the bog. I had come round that way, and you were leaping with a
pole about the bog, and I--stayed to watch you. I hope you don't mind;"
this foolish girl was blushing again furiously, which was most
unnecessary; "and--I thought you must be a foreigner; I don't know why.
And--and then you came out, and turned a somersault, and--I wondered
why, that was all. You see, I never had a brother, and I have never
known any boys in all my life till now. I don't mean that you are a boy,
of course!"

"Oh, but I _am_!" cried Gerald. "What else am I but a boy? I wish they
could hear you at home. Why, I'm just Jerry, you know, and--and I've
always been that kind of boy, I'm afraid; just like Willy, only a good
deal worse. And now--well, I've been through college, and now I'm in the
School of Mines, and I'm twenty-one, and all that, but I can't seem to
make myself feel any older, don't you know. I don't know what's going to
become of me. Hilda says I won't grow up till I fall--oh! you don't
know Hilda, do you, Miss Montfort?"

"Hilda?" repeated Margaret. "I only know Hilda in the 'Marble Faun.'"

"Hildegarde Merryweather; Hildegarde Grahame she used to be. I thought
you might possibly have--well, she's my aunt according to the flesh. I
wish you did know her!"

"Your aunt? Is she--is she about Uncle John's age? I know so few people,
you see. I have lived a very quiet life."

"Oh, no! She--well, I suppose she's a little older than you, but not
very much. She married Roger, don't you know. He's my half-uncle all
right, but he's ever so many years younger than the Pater, nearer our
age, you might almost say; and Hildegarde and the girls, my sisters,--I
say! I wish you knew them all, Miss Montfort."

"I wish I did," said Margaret, simply. "There are no girls of my own age
near here. Last year I had my cousins, and I miss them so much!"

"Of course you must!" said sympathetic Gerald. "Girls are no end--I--I
mean, I like them too, ever so much." He paused, and wished he knew the
right thing to say. How pretty and sweet she was! Not like Hilda, of
course (Hilda was this