dear! Let us get out of
this stifling room, and into the blessed out-of-doors. We'll go into the
grove for a little walk. These four walls have been just smothering me
all day!"

Genevieve opened wide her eyes.

"Why, do _you_ feel that way--too?" she asked incredulously.

Miss Hart colored a little.

"I'm afraid I do, my dear--though probably I ought not to have said just
that--to you," she sighed constrainedly. "But--to tell the truth, I've
never been able quite to see what houses were made for, I suspect, since
I used to ask that question as a little girl. I imagine 'twas in summer,
however, not winter, when I asked it," she finished a little
tremulously, as they passed through the hall to the outer door.

Once again Genevieve opened wide her eyes.

"Did you ask that--really? Why, Father says that was one of _my_
questions, too," she breathed rapturously. "Why, you are--you are just
like--" with a little cough Genevieve choked off the "folks" before it
was spoken. The word was "me" when it finally left her lips.

It was a wonderful half-hour that Genevieve spent then in the grove.
Over in the west the sun was low, and the shadows were long under the
trees. The air was crisp, but not too crisp, if one were walking--and
she and Miss Hart were walking. They were talking, too.

They talked of birds and beasts and flowers. They talked of school and
study, and Latin lessons that were so hard to learn when the
out-of-doors called. They talked of the days and lessons to come; and
they spoke--at least, Miss Hart did--of what fine work Genevieve was
sure to do before the year was through. They did not talk, however, of
Miss Hart's tears in the classroom, nor of Miss Hart's letter still
tightly clutched in Genevieve's hand.

Genevieve, however, had not forgotten the letter; and when she walked
alone toward home, a little later, she wondered what she should do with
it. To give it openly back to Miss Hart, she felt was not to be thought
of; at the same time she doubted if in any other way she could return it
to her now. The letter certainly had already accomplished two things:
never again would she so misjudge Miss Hart; never again, too, would she
let the others so misjudge her, if she could help it--and she believed
she could help it. She should try, certainly. As for the letter--

"Well, Miss," broke in Harold's slightly aggrieved voice behind her, "is
_this_ the way you practise, and study your Latin and your Frenc