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Show 8 Ghl t j A ROMANCE E 1 WISdeeo I Sd.Hl iv.iv! D JttCU head. "Oh, it doesn't matter'.!' answers Shell condescendingly. "Now then, young monkeys if you are ready we may as well start," he says, pointing to the trap which Is waiting wait-ing in the avenue. "I am going to take you for a drive right around by thu sea." "Take Sell too, pa," plead3 Meg, catching her father's hand and fairly jumping with delight. "With pleasure, if she will only consent con-sent to go," is his ready answer, whilst I he darts an amused glance at the girl's flushed vexed face. "No, thanks I hate driving," responds re-sponds Shell curtly. "You seem to have a great many detestations, de-testations, Miss Shell," says the gentleman gen-tleman sarcastically. "I have," is Shell's laconic answer. "Well, then, since we can't persuade you to accompany us, we may as well start. Come children!" and, making no effort to shake hauds, he raises ffia hat politely. A latent fear that she has been inhospitable in-hospitable assails Shell. "Won't you go up to the house?" she asks almost eagerly. "No, thank you since I have been fortunate enough to meet with the children here. Good morning." "Good morning," answers Shell stiffly, stiff-ly, and Quite ignoring the two little faces that are turned up to her for a good-bye kiss. "Papa, is us naughty?" asks Meg as she trots over to the trap beside her father. "I hope not. Why?" he demands absently. "Cause Shell didn't kiss us," answers an-swers Meg in a wondering tone. "Kiss you!" repeats her father, laughing. "She looked far more likely to bite." But, all the same, as he makes the assertion a memory of Shell as he first came to her, with sparkling eyes and smiling lips, and the two children kneeling beside her, rises before his mental vision. "Well, have you got rid of those little torments?" asks Ruby languidly, looking up from her book as Shell enters en-ters the room. "Their father has just come for them," answers Shell shortly. "Their father oh, where is he?" cries Ruby, starting from her chair. "I want to consult him about Bob's writing; and I must speak about the nurse; I am afraid she is not very careful Meg's hands were quite dirty this morning. Where is he where did you leave him?" "He is down by the sea; I didn't leave him he left me," answers Shell drily. "Why did no one tell me he wa3 here?" asks Ruby angrily. "He didn't come to the house; I was in the drive with the children, and he picked them up there." "How very strange! But it is all your fault, taking them out the foolish fool-ish way you do. I suppose you wera romping like a tom-boy when he came." "I was telling them stories." "Anyway you were a ridiculous object," ob-ject," says Ruby, with such an obviously ob-viously scornful sneer that Shell instinctively in-stinctively glances across the room at her reflection in the mirror, then for the first time becoming aware of her profuse decorations. With a sudden access of wrath she tears the daisies from her hair, whilst tears of mortification mortifi-cation rise to her eyes. "I wouldn't have had him see me so for a hundred pounds," she says -angrily. "What nonsense! I don't suppose that he even noticed them," observes Ruby with cutting scorn. "Ah, perhaps not!" murmurs Shell with a sigh of relief; and yet, thinking it over, she remembers clearly that twice or three times during their short interview she noticed ajt amused snillJ flicker over his face. (To be Continued.) JH M - - CHAPTER IV. (Continued.) "You don't seem altogether happy in here," a cheery voice calls out at this moment, as Shell's somewhat mocking face appears at the open window. "Happy!" cries Ruby derisively. "Would you feel happy caged up with a couple of young bears? The children have been behaving shamefully." "Have they?" returns Shell in a tone which denotes doubt, as she steps in over the low window ledge, and gently begins to stroke Meg's hair, which has become disheveled through her various va-rious emotions. The child nestles up against her side, clasping her skirts firmly, as if for protection, pro-tection, while Bob indulges in a vigorous vigor-ous welcoming nod, for he knows he is not allowed to speak. "Yes, they have given me quite a headache," pursues Ruby, pressing her hand to her brow. "I shall be fit for nothing the rest of the day if I can't get rid of it. I wish you would hear the children read for me." "Why should I?" answers Shell bluntly. "As you know, I disapprove of their coming here; and I told you from the first to expect no help from me!" Shell speaks in French, that the children chil-dren may not understand; but Meg-guesses Meg-guesses with the quick Instinct of childhood that she is refusing to take charge of them. "You hear me read, Sell?" she lisps with a look of almost piteous entreaty on her baby face. "Me will be dood." Shell looks down for a moment with unrelenting eyes then she catches Meg up in her strong young arms, gives her a resounding kiss, and turning to Ruby, says "All right if you are tired I don't mind looking after them till they are fetched only I don't profess to be a good hand at teaching." "I wish you wouldn't be so rough with them," says Ruby, rising from her chair with a sigh of intense relief. "Now us is happy!" cries Bob, sliding slid-ing down from his chair and stretching his small arms with delight as Ruby disappears. "But us must go on with our lessons," les-sons," says Shell gravely. "All right," acquiesces Bob, as he begins be-gins to hunt for their reading book. "You sit down in the big chair and have Meg on your lap, like you did last time; and I can stand beside you." "My dear children, isn't it rather hot for that kind of arrangement?" expostulates ex-postulates Shell, as Meg springs into her arms, whilst Bob installs himself him-self with his arm around her neck. But the children only know that they love her, and want to be as near her as possible; any such minor consideration con-sideration as the state of the thermometer thermo-meter is a matter of supreme indifference indiffer-ence to their inexperienced and consequently conse-quently selfish little minds. That evening, as luck will have it, when the children come in to dessert, their father begins to question them as to their conduct. "I hope you were both very good children this morning?" he says, helping help-ing each to a plentiful supply of strawberries. straw-berries. "No, pa us wasn't berry good," falters falt-ers Meg, with downcast eyes and burning burn-ing cheeks. "Dear me that is very sad, Meg!" says Robert Champley, with a laughing laugh-ing glance across the table at Ted. "How did you misbehave yourselves?" "I didn't know tree times four," replies re-plies Meg, looking deeply abashed. "That was extremely wicked of you,"' says her father smiling. "And, now that Meg has made an open confession of her sins, we must hear your enormities, Mr. Bobby," laughs his uncle. "How did you offend Miss Wilden?" Bob heaves a profound sigh. "I did somefink dreadful," he says in a low shamed voice. "Something dreadful?" repeats Ted, looking intensely amused. "Come out with it." "Papa, dear, don't be angry wid Bob he didn't know," interposes Meg, suddenly, laying hold of her father's arm and hugging it vigorously. "Dear me, this is getting alarming! alarm-ing! What did you do, Bob?" asks Mr. Champley with real interest. Bob takes a kind of gulp to swallow swal-low down his fear and then he says in an awestruck voice "I pulled her hair out." "Good gracious whose hair?" asks his father, looking startled. "Miss Wilden's," explains Bob, much alarmed at the sensation his announcement announce-ment had created. "You young villain!" exclaims his uncle. "What induced you to attack a lady like that?" "I didn't attack her," says poor Bob on the verge of sobs. "I just pulled out her pins for fun, when she was setting my copy, and then all her hair tumbled down on the carpet." "Not all," hastened to explain Meg "only a lot of it." Ted Champley is seized with a violent vio-lent fit of coughing, which sends him over to the window for relief whilst his elder brother as suddenly develops a cold, which necessitates a vast amount of handkerchief play before he speaks again, then he says quietly to Bob "That was very ungentlemaiily of you, and if I hear of your being rude again I shall punish you." CHAPTER V. This threat from his usually indulgent indulg-ent father has such a depressing effect on Bob's spirits that he makes up his mind to eschew temptation for the future. fu-ture. "Miss Wilden won't love you if you don't behave like a gentleman," continues con-tinues the father severely, as an appropriate appro-priate ending to his reprimand. "Us don't love Miss Wilden," her'e interrupts Meg with great dignity "she is a nasty cross old ting." "Nonsense, Meg!" says her father, placing his hand under her chin and smiling down into her eyes. "If you don't love Miss Wilden, I am afraid you must be a hardened little wretch, for" with a dreary sigh "alas, she is only too devoted to you!" Meg shakes her head in an uncomprehending uncom-prehending way, and repeats, with a determined little pout "Us don't like her us loves Sell." "Yes, us loves dear Shell," chimes in Bob eagerly. "She tells us lovely stories." "My dear misguided children, your affection for Miss Shell is decidedly misplaced," here interrupts their uncle, returning from his post at the window. win-dow. "She doesn't like boys and girls at all." "Not like little boys and derls?" repeats re-peats Meg, qu-te taken aback by such an extraordinary statement. "No, indeed in fact she gave me to understand that she almost hated them," repeats Ted, much amused at the children's look of horror. "So I strongly advise y.ou not to waste your young affections on such an unresponsive unrespons-ive object." The warning, being clothed in words beyond their understanding, makes no impression on the children's minds, but their strong preference for the younger sister strikes their father forcibly, forc-ibly, and he catches himself murmuring murmur-ing more than once in a wondering tone "Us loves Shell; us loves dear Shell!" After that it often happens that Ruby, Ru-by, under some trifling pretext or other, shifts the burden of her self-imposed task on to Shell's young shoulders she has a headache, or is busy, or has letters to write; and then Shell, taking pity on the poor children who are sure to have a rough time of it if Ruby is disinclined for them devotes her morning to their instruction and amusement. She bribes them to be good at their lessons by the promise of a romp in the grounds when their task is completed; com-pleted; and so it happens that Robert Champley, chancing to drive over himself him-self to fetch them ono late June morning, morn-ing, comes upon an unexpected and to him a charming sight. On a moss-grown mound at the front of a copper-beech sits Shell in a dark print gown, with her bright hair coiled around and around with daisy-chains, which the children's busy fingers have been weaving, whilst she tells them a wonderful tale from Fairyland. So engrossed are all three that they do not become aware of the intruder's approach until he has descended from the trap and walked quietly to withfn a few paces of their resting place; then a shout of "Papa, papa!" from Meg rouses them all from their ideal world to a realistic one. Shell starts from her lowly seat, crimsons to the very roots of her hair! and puts on as forbidding a look as she can well assume. "Oh, pa, it is so jolly; you come and listen, too!" cries Bob, eager that his father should participate in their enjoyment. en-joyment. "The princess Is shut up in a dark room, because her wicked godmother god-mother won't allow her ever to see the sunshine, and the prince is keopin" guard outside her tower with a carriage and six, to carry her away to an island blazing with light if he gets the chance." "Rather trying for her eyes, won't it be? I should be inclined to recommend recom-mend her a pair of spectacles till she gets used to the glare," laughs Robert Champley as he shakes hands with Shell. But Shell has become fossilized Sho shakes hands limply, pllts on a stolid conventional expression, and, draw-in-her small figure up to its fullest height" tries to look exceedingly dignillod He-efforts He-efforts are somewhat marred by the daisies so profusely twisted around her head; but. as she is happily fo,.K,HuI of Uieir presence, they do not trouble "Sell, dear, she didn't have blue speo-aces speo-aces .did she?" cries Meg, shocked at such a very unromantic suggestion. Shell lnnt.kn0W,I"m SU,''" rt,sl'on.l Shell in a tone of cold Indifference Cut oo does know," cries 11,., wax- kfrt T,t,C"1- ",ml skitU luheranxielyto have the doubt ''I am arraid my children arc wcarv- ;i nd the easiest way to keep ,hem Shell 11 ? " Uu'm Ktorlen," Bavs Sl.c l bluntly and un,;racloslv ' t'-mlh'Trouir V'"mUl ,"' Champlev wit ' ' , "'""'kH Mr. . ltU a curious and ralher |