"Yes," said Carrots. "How did you guess? You're like a fairy, auntie." But then his face grew troubled again. "I forgot," he went on, "it's a secret. It's Floss's secret too. I would so like to tell you, for I don't know what to do. I don't mind having no tea, but they all thought I was naughty."

"Wait a minute," said auntie. She hurried out of the room, but was back in a minute.

"I've asked Floss," she said, "and she gives you leave to tell me. So now, perhaps, when I know all about it, I can tell you what to do."

The telling did not take Carrots long; he was so glad to show auntie he had not meant to be naughty. Auntie listened quite gravely, and when he had finished she said she thought he was quite right not to take any sugar.

"But do you think Floss did?" said Carrots, anxiously.

"Perhaps having tea in the dining-room made her forget," said auntie. "We'll ask her afterwards, and if she did forget, I'll tell you what she must do. She must go without one day longer than you. Now come along with me, and I'll make it all right, you'll see."

When they got back to the dining-room auntie quietly lifted Carrots on to his chair again, and said to his mamma with a smile, "It was all a mistake; I thought it was; Carrots was not naughty at all, and he is quite happy again now."

And Mrs. Desart smiled too, so Carrots really did feel happy again. But he wondered what auntie would do about the tea, which was still standing there as he had left it, and it would be wrong to "waste" it, thought Carrots.

Sybil was sitting on auntie's other side, and auntie glancing at her cup saw that it was empty. So auntie quietly put Carrots' cup before Sybil and gave Carrots the empty one.

"Cecil," she said, "will you give Carrots some tea without any sugar?"

Cecil saw that auntie had some reason for asking this, so she gave Carrots the tea as auntie said, and Carrots drank it and ate his bread and butter and a piece of cake, with great content.

The only person who did not seem quite contented was Sybil.

"Mother," she whispered, "I don't like having Carrots' tea. It's quite cold."

But as Carrots didn't hear it, it didn't much matter. For you see, Sybil had had one cup of nice hot tea, so she was not so badly off after all.

And, alas! the very next morning auntie and Sybil had to go away. And the long-talked of and fancied-about visit was over.

CHAPTER X.

A JOURNEY AND ITS ENDING.

But with the finer weather she seemed to get better again. The children were of course very glad, but still they had not felt frightened by her illness. It had come on so slowly and gradually that they had got accustomed to it, as children do. They thought it was just the cold wintry weather that had made her ill, and that when the spring came she would get better. And when the spring came and she did get better, they were perfectly satisfied and happy.

By the end of this summer Carrots was seven years old—no longer in the least a baby, though he was not tall for his age. He could read, of course, perfectly, and write a little. Now and then he wrote little letters to Sybil in answer to hers, for she was very particular about getting answers. She was only just beginning to learn to write, and sometimes when she got tired of working away at real "A's" and "B's" and "C's" in her letters, she would dash off into a lot of "scribble," which she said was "children's writing," and "if Carrots didn't know what it meant he must be very stupid, as he was a child too."

Carrots didn't know what it meant, but he never liked to say so, and I dare say it did not much matter. But his letters to Sybil were quite real. Any one could have understood them.

Long ago Floss and he had bought their hoops. They were quite "old friends" now. They had bought them at the toy-shop, just as they had planned, and, curiously enough when their mamma and nurse counted up how much was owing to them for the sugar, it came to exactly the price of the hoops.

But I must tell you what happened just about the time Carrots had his seventh birthday. The summer was nearly over again and already the cold winds, of which there were so many at Sandyshore, were beginning to be felt. Floss noticed that her mother very seldom went out now, and even in the house she generally had to wrap herself up in a shawl.

"Mamma, I hope the cold weather isn't going to make you ill again?" Floss said, one day when she and Carrots came in from a race on the sands, all hot and rosy with running.

"I don't know, dear," said her mother with a little sigh.

"I wish you could run about like us. That would make you so hot," said Carrots.

Mrs. Desart smiled. Just then her glance happened to fall on Floss's boots. "My dear child," she said, "those boots are really not fit to go out with. There's a great hole at the side of one of them."

"I know, mamma," said Floss, "but they're going to be mended. Nurse thinks they'll do a good while longer, if they're mended. I hope they will, for I know you always have so many new things to get when winter begins to come—haven't you, mamma?"

Mrs. Desart sighed again.

"I should have liked all your things to be so nice," she said, more as if speaking to herself than to Floss, "but it can't be helped."

Something in her tone caught Floss's attention.

"Why, mamma?" she asked, "why did you want our things to be so nice?"

"Because, dears, you may be going away from home," replied Mrs. Desart.

Floss and Carrots stared with astonishment. "Going away from home," Floss repeated, utterly unable to say more. Carrots could say nothing at all, he could only stare.

"Yes," continued Mrs. Desart, "I had meant to tell you about it before, but I have kept putting it off—" she stopped and seemed to hesitate.

"Why, mamma?" said Floss again. "Don't you like us to go? Are you coming with us, mamma?"

"Are we going to auntie's?" said Carrots.

His asking this seemed to please his mother.

"You would like to go to auntie's, wouldn't you, Carrots?" she said.

Carrots stroked his mother's shawl up and down two or three times before he answered.

"I'd like to go if you would come too," he said at last, "but I think I would rather stay at home, thank you, if you can't come."

Mrs. Desart's eyes filled with tears. "Poor little Carrots!" she said, softly smoothing his curls with her hand. "But if it would please me for Floss and you to go without me?" she said.

"I'll go if you want me to go, mamma," said Carrots.

"I must explain a little," said Mrs. Desart, and then she went on to tell the children how it was. The doctor had said she must not risk another winter at Sandyshore, and it had been arranged for her to go to a warmer climate. Cecil and Louise were to go with her; Captain Desart would be with them as much as he possibly could, and Maurice was to live at school. And what concerned the two little ones almost more than anything, nurse was to go too! "I must have some one kind and sensible with me, in case, in case—" and again Mrs. Desart hesitated.

"In case you were very tired with travelling, or if you were to get a bad cold again; somebody who could make nice white wine whey and things like that," said Floss, who was of a practical turn of mind, "oh yes, mamma, I quite understand."

"Though nurse is getting old, she has been so much accustomed to travelling, too," said Mrs. Desart, "and we are going a long way—to Algeria; Floss, do you know where that is?"

"Over the sea!" said Floss, "I wish we might come too, mamma, Carrots and I," she exclaimed. "You will be so far away."

"But you will be with auntie, and you know how kind auntie is," said her mother, forcing herself to speak cheerfully. "And it is such a pretty place where auntie lives."

"Is the sea there?" said Carrots.

"No, but the hills are," answered Mrs. Desart with a smile. "I am quite sure you will like it." And she went on to tell them so much about auntie's pretty home that for a little they almost forgot everything but the pleasant part of the change that was to come so soon.

And it did come very soon. It seemed but a few days from the afternoon they had first heard about it all, when Floss and Carrots found themselves early one morning at the little railway station with their father, waiting for the train.

Captain Desart was to travel with them for the first hour, to take them to the "junction" where they were to change and get into a train which would take them straight to Whitefriars, near which was auntie's house.

You will laugh, children, I dare say, and think Floss and Carrots very countrified and ignorant when I tell you that they had never been a long railway journey before. Never, that is to say, that they could remember—for their parents had come to Sandyshore when Floss was a baby, and Carrots, as you know, had been born there.

So you can hardly fancy what a wonderful event this journey was to them.

Their little hearts were very full at first after parting with their mother, and sisters, and nurse, and all that made the Cove House home to them.

And their mamma had kissed them so many times, as if she could not really say good-bye, though she was not generally a very petting or kissing mamma, but rather quiet and grave.

And nurse had the tears in her eyes, and Louise had them pouring down her face, and Cecil had her face squeezed up in a sort of way that Floss knew meant she was determined she would not cry. Floss felt troubled in a way she could not understand, and I think Carrots did too. They had a feeling that the bigger people knew of more reason for sorrow than had been told to them, and yet they could not imagine what it could be. And after all, to them the parting for even four or five months was almost as great a trouble as they could understand! only they were going to "auntie's!"

"And we will try to be so good, dear mamma," said Floss, bravely choking down her tears. "We will try to get on with our lessons, too, and write you nice letters. And—and—" here a sob or two would make its way, "I can't help crying a little; but I'm sure we shall be very happy, won't we Carrots?"

"If mamma wants us to be happy, we'll try, won't we Floss?" said Carrots. He wiped the tears on his mother's cheeks with his own little pocket handkerchief and looked up in her face piteously. "Please don't cry, poor mamma," he said; "we will be good and happy."

Then their father came in and hurried them off, and the farewells were over—that part of them, at least, for the saying goodbye to Captain Desart at the junction was rather hard too.

And at last Floss and Carrots find themselves at the height of their ambition—alone in a railway carriage travelling to auntie's! But they do not seem so delighted as they used to fancy they would; they do not jump about and laugh and chatter in their overflowing pleasure—they sit quite still, side by side, holding each other's hands and with little quiet grave faces.

"Things never come the same as people fancy," said Floss at last. "We never thought we should go to auntie's because poor mamma was ill, did we Carrots?"

"No, we never did," said Carrots. "But mamma will soon get better, won't she, Floss, at that nice warm place?"

"Oh yes, of course she will," said Floss. "But it's a long way away Carrots, and I never thought going to auntie's would be like this."

"No," agreed Carrots again, "we never did."

"I'm so sorry to leave them all, aren't you, Carrots?" said Floss, her voice trembling a little.

"Yes," said Carrots; "and Floss, I'm very sorry, too, to leave the sea. I never left the sea before, you know."

"But the sea won't miss you," said Floss, "and poor mamma and nursie and all of them will miss us. That's what I keep thinking of."

"When should we eat our dinner, Floss?" said Carrots, with an instinct that it would be as well to change the subject.

"Not just yet. When we've gone about half way would do; and papa said that great big place, Millingham, would be about half way."

"But if there were any other people to get into the carriage?" said Carrots.

"Well, it wouldn't matter," said Floss. "People must eat when they are travelling."

"But wouldn't we have to ask them to have some too?" suggested Carrots.

"I don't know," said Floss; "I never thought of that. Perhaps it would be polite. But there are only eight sandwiches, Carrots; eight sandwiches and four sponge cakes and a packet of Albert biscuits. I hope a great many people won't get in."

No one got in at the next station. Only the guard put his head in at the door, as Captain Desart had asked him to do, to see how the little pair were getting on. Carrots had thoughts of offering him a sandwich, but he disappeared before there was time to do so, which Floss thought very fortunate when she heard of Carrots' intention. "For you see," she said, "if we began offering them to him, we would have to do it at every station, and if there are eight stations before Whitefriars, all our sandwiches would be gone."

"He might have a biscuit for a change," said Carrots, submissive, but scarcely convinced. "He is a nice man, Floss—he calls us 'Well, sir,' and 'Miss.' Do you think papa told him to say 'Well, sir,' and 'Miss?'"

But before Floss had time to answer they had stopped again, and this time some one did get into their carriage. The new-comer was a small, neat, oldish lady. She looked rather grim at first, but after a while she grew decidedly friendly, and no wonder; for at Millingham Floss and Carrots unpacked their little basket of provisions, and I don't think the grimmest of maiden ladies could have remained grim after the politeness with which the children treated her.

They selected the nicest looking sandwich, putting it on an Albert biscuit by way of a plate, and then, at a sign from Floss, Carrots clambered down from his seat and gravely offered it to the lady.

"I'm sorry there's no mustard, if you like mustard," said Floss; "but Carrots and I don't like it, and—and—I suppose nurse didn't think of anyone else."

The oldish lady looked at the children for a moment before she replied.

"I am very much obliged to you," she said at last, "but I think I won't take a sandwich, as I had luncheon before I left home. But if you will allow me I will have a biscuit. I am very fond of biscuits."

"I'm so glad," said Floss, hospitably. "Now, Carrots," she said in a lower voice, "you eat two sandwiches and I'll eat two, and we'll each have one sponge cake. And that'll do for dinner. We'll eat the rest in about an hour and pretend we're having tea early."

The lady asked them a good many questions after this, and told them they were such well-behaved children, she would not mind travelling all the way to Whitefriars with them. Floss blushed a little at this; it made her feel shy to be praised to her face, but still no doubt the lady meant it kindly, and they were rather sorry when she left them, some stations before they got to Whitefriars. Their old friend the guard left them here, too, but he popped his head in for the last time to say that he was going to speak for them to "him that was coming on now." And Floss thanked him, though she had not the least idea what he meant.

But there must have been some mistake about it, for the new guard never came near them, and when, at the last stoppage before Whitefriars, another man threw the door open and demanded "tickets," Floss felt too startled by his rough manner to ask him what they were longing to know, how far they still had to go. But he took away the tickets. "So we can't have very far to go," said Floss. "Papa said they would take away the tickets a little before we got to Whitefriars."

"Will auntie be at the station?" said Carrots.

"Yes, I'm sure she will," said Floss. "Auntie and Sybil too, perhaps. Carrots, I do believe we're there; the train's stopping."

And in another minute they found themselves in a nice clean-looking station with several people standing about on the platform, evidently waiting for the train.

The children looked out eagerly. There were two or three ladies, one little girl, and a few other people—but no auntie, no Sybil!

"P'raps this isn't the place," said Carrots.

"Please, is this Whitefriars?" inquired Floss of a porter who just then threw open the door.

"Whitefriars, yes miss. Any luggage?"

"Oh yes," said Floss anxiously, "a great deal It's in one of the luggage carriages, and it's marked with our name."

The man smiled. "Will you come with me, missie, and show me which it is, and I'll get it all right for you."

"Oh, thank you," said Floss, gathering together their cloaks and baskets, and preparing to descend.

"What a kind man," whispered Carrots; and when the porter lifted him out of the carriage he took hold of his hand and ran along beside him as fast as his little legs could keep up.

Floss felt quite bewildered at first, when she saw the heaps and heaps of luggage lying on the platform, all labelled "Whitefriars." It seemed to her that everybody must have been travelling to Whitefriars to-day! But by degrees it was claimed and melted away, and the kind porter, to whom she had already pointed out their "great deal"—one portmanteau, one bag, and a small tin hat-box—soon picked it up and stood waiting for further orders.

"Where am I to take it to, please miss?" he said. "Is there no one here to meet you?"

"I don't think so, I don't know what to do," said Floss, looking sadly troubled again. In the excitement of finding the luggage she had forgotten this new difficulty, but now it returned in full force.

"Have you far to go?" said the man.

"Oh no," said Floss, "auntie's house is near here, I know."

"Then perhaps little master and you had better walk on, and send for the luggage afterwards?" suggested the man, never doubting from Floss's manner that the children were accustomed to the place, and knew their way.

"Yes, I suppose so," said Floss uncertainly.

"Or shall I fetch you a fly from the Blue Boar?" said the man. "The station flies has all drove off."

"No, thank you; I don't think I have enough money for that," said Floss, feeling in her pocket for her purse, which she knew contained only her father's parting gift of half-a-crown, a sixpence with a hole in, and three pennies of Carrots'! "Your auntie says she will get you everything you want, so I need not give you any money with you," their mother had said. Floss had no idea what a fly from the Blue Boar would cost, but it sounded very grand, and she hardly dared to risk it.

"Well, I daresay you'll be safest to walk," said the porter, rather afraid of getting himself into a scrape if he fetched the children a fly without proper authority, and feeling uncertain, from their very plain and rather "countrified" appearance, if their friends belonged to the fly patronising class or not. "I'll keep the luggage safe till it's sent for—no fear," and with a friendly nod he marched off with their possessions.

Holding Carrots by the hand, Floss made her way out of the station. For about a quarter of a mile the road ran straight before them and they trudged along contentedly enough. But after awhile they came to a point where two roads met, one leading to the little watering-place (for the station was some way from the town), the other out into the country. And for the first time it struck Floss that she did not know the way. She looked about her in perplexity.

"It cannot be far," she said; "mamma always said auntie lived near Whitefriars. But I wish I knew which way to go."

Carrots had no suggestion to offer. To make matters worse, it began to rain—a cold, sleety, late October rain; the children had no umbrella, and were already tired and hungry. I think it was much to their credit that they did not lose heart altogether.

Just as Floss was making up her mind to take the turn leading in the distance to terraces of houses and gardens and other signs of civilisation, there came, jogging along the road on a cart-horse, a farmer's boy. Joyful sight! Floss plucked up heart.

"Can you tell me, please," she called out, "which is the way to Greenmays?"

The farmer's boy turned his thumb in the direction of the country road. "Yonder," he shouted, without stopping in his jog, "straight on past the church, and down lane to left."

"Is it far?" asked Floss, but the boy did not seem to hear.

There was nothing for it but to go on with their trudge. The rain was not heavy but very piercingly cold, and the daylight was beginning to fade. Two or three hot tears at last forced their way down Floss's cheeks, but she wiped them quickly away, before Carrots could see them. Carrots said nothing, but Floss knew he was getting tired by the way he kept lagging behind, every now and then giving a little run to get up to Floss again.

"I shouldn't mind so much, Floss," he said at last, "if it would be home when we get there, and if we were to find mamma and nurse and tea in our own nursery waiting for us."

This was altogether too much for Floss. For a moment or two she could not speak, she was choked with sobs. "Oh, how I do wish poor mamma hadn't got ill," she said at last.

"Poor Flossie, dear Flossie," said Carrots, pulling down her face to kiss in spite of the rain and the dark and the cold and everything. "I didn't mean to make you cry. And auntie will be very kind when we get there, won't she, Floss?"

"Oh yes," said Floss, trying to speak cheerfully, though in her secret heart there was a little misgiving. It did not look very kind not to have sent to meet them at the station, and even without this, Floss, though she had not said so, had felt a little shy and frightened at the thought of meeting auntie and the strange uncle, and even Sybil again. It was nearly two years since the visit to Sandyshore, and two years is a lifetime to a child—it seemed to Floss like going altogether among strangers. She clasped her little brother's hand tighter as these feelings passed through her mind. "It won't be so bad for Carrots," she reflected; "any way he will have me."

They seemed to have walked a very weary way when at last the church, of which the farmer's boy had spoken, came in sight—very dimly in sight, for the daylight was fast dying away. Floss would have passed the church without noticing it, but the road divided in two just at this place, and she was obliged to think which way to go. Then the boy's directions came into her mind.

"To the left past the church, didn't he say, Carrots?" she said.

"'Down lane to left,' he said," replied Carrots.

"Then it must be this way," said Floss, and on they trudged.

In a few minutes they came to large gates, on one side of which stood a pretty little house, but such a little house, hardly bigger than a cottage.

"Is that auntie's house?" said Carrots.

"I'm afraid it's too little to be auntie's house," said Floss. "I wish it was. I would much rather auntie lived in a cottage."

"Just like Mrs. White's," said Carrots.

Floss could not help laughing at him; it had left off raining and her spirits were rising a little.

"Look Carrots," she said, "there is a light in the cottage window. We'd better knock at the door and ask if it is auntie's house. It's getting rather like a fairy story, isn't it Carrots? Fancy if somebody calls out 'Pull the string and the latch will open.'"

"But that would be the wolf, Floss," said Carrots, pressing closer to his sister.

It was no wolf, but a nice, tidy-looking woman with a white cap and a baby in her arms who opened the door, and stood staring at the two little wayfarers in bewilderment. Floss grew afraid that she was angry.

"I'm very sorry—I mean I beg your pardon," she began. "I didn't know this was your house. We thought perhaps it was auntie's. Can you tell me, please, where Greenmays is?"

"This is Greenmays," said the woman. Floss stared: the door opened right into the kitchen, it couldn't be auntie's house.

"This is the lodge," continued the woman. "If it's someone at the big house you're wanting, you must just go straight up the drive. I'd show you the way," she went on, "but my husband's up at the stables and it's too cold for baby. You seem wet and tired, you do—have you come far?"

"Yes," said Floss, wearily, "very far. We thought auntie would meet us at the station, but there wasn't anybody."

"They must be kin to the housekeeper, surely," thought the woman. And yet something indescribable in Floss's manner, and in the clear, well-bred tones of her small, childish voice, prevented her asking if this was so. "I wish I could go with you to the house," she repeated, curiosity and kindliness alike prompting her, "but," she added, looking doubtfully at the sleeping child in her arms, "I'm afeared for baby."

"Oh, it doesn't matter, thank you," said Floss, "we can find the way, I daresay. Good evening," and taking Carrots by the hand, she turned to go.

"Good evening," said little Carrots also.

"Good evening, and I hope you'll find your auntie in," said the woman. And for a few minutes she stood at the door straining her eyes after the two forlorn little figures till she could distinguish them no longer in the darkness of the trees bordering the avenue. "Who can they be?" she said to herself. "Such a pretty spoken, old-fashioned little pair I never did see!"

CHAPTER XI.

HAPPY AND SAD.

"I don't know," replied Carrots, "auntie will be very kind to us, won't she, Floss?"

"Oh yes," said Floss, "but supposing she is having a party to-night, Carrots?"

"Well, we could have tea in the nursery, and go to bed," said Carrots philosophically. "Oh Floss, wouldn't you like some nice hot tea and bread and butter?"

"Poor Carrots," said Floss. And her anxiety to see her little brother in comfort again gave her courage to ring the bell as loudly as she could.

A manservant opened the door. Very tall and formidable he looked to the two children, whose eyes were dazzled by the sudden light, after their long walk in the dusk.

"If you please," said Floss, "is auntie at home?"

The man stared. "What did you say?" he inquired. "Is it a message from some one?"

"Oh no," said Floss, "it's just that we've come, Carrots and I—will you please tell auntie? We've walked all the way from the station, because there was no one to meet us."

The man still stared. He had heard something about a young lady and gentleman, his mistress's nephew and niece, being expected on a visit, but his ideas were rather slow. He could not all at once take in that the dilapidated little couple before him could possibly be the looked for guests.

But just then another person came upon the scene. A little figure with bright dark eyes and flying hair came dancing into the hall.

"Who's there, Fletcher?" she said. "Is it the post?"

"No miss," said Fletcher, rather glad of some one to consult in his perplexity. "I don't know who it is—that's to say, it's a little boy and girl who say as they've come from the station, but I can't justly make out who it is they want."

"How funny," said Sybil, coming forward and peering out from under Fletcher's arm, "perhaps they'll tell me what they want. Who are you, little girl? Is it my mother you want? Will you give me your message?"

She looked more like a little princess than ever. She was dressed to go down to the drawing-room before dinner—all white embroidery and lace and rose-coloured ribbons. Floss and Carrots looked at her with a sort of dazzled admiration, mingled with shy bewilderment. It all seemed more of a mistake than ever—Sybil was evidently not expecting them—if only the railway station had not been so dreadfully far away, Floss felt as if she would have liked to take Carrots by the hand and go away back again, all the long weary way to Sandyshore!

But Carrots' faith in auntie and Sybil was unshaken—and his childlike confidence less susceptible of chill. Partly from mortification, partly to hide that she was crying, Floss stood perfectly silent, but Carrots pressed forward.

"It is Flossie and me, Sybil—don't you remember us? We've walked such a long way, and there was nobody to meet us at the station, and we are so cold and so hungry!"

Sybil gave a sort of leap into the air. "Floss and Carrots!" she cried, "oh mother, mother, come quick, here are Floss and Carrots!"

She seemed to fly across the hall in one second, and darting down a passage disappeared, crying out all the way, "Flossie and Carrots—oh mother, mother, come."

And before the children had time to consider what they had best do, and long before the very deliberate Mr. Fletcher had collected his wits sufficiently to decide upon inviting them to come in, Sybil was back again, closely followed by her mother, whom she had dragged out of the drawing-room without any other explanation than her cry of "Floss and Carrots, oh mother, Flossie and Carrots."

And when Floss saw auntie running to them, with her kind face all eagerness and anxiety, the shyness and the disappointment and the mortification all seemed suddenly to melt away. She rushed into the hall and threw herself sobbing into auntie's arms. "Oh auntie," she cried, "we are so tired—poor Carrots is I mean, and so hungry, and I thought you had forgotten us, and we're so far away from mamma."

Auntie understood all about it in a moment. She hugged Floss tight, and only let go of her for an instant to get hold of Carrots and hug him tight too. And then, when she saw the two tired little white faces, and felt how wet they were, and saw the tears on Floss's cheeks, she sat down on the hall floor, still clasping them tight, and actually cried too.

"My two poor dear little babes in the wood," she exclaimed. "What a dreadful mistake! What a cruel auntie you must have thought me!"

"I didn't know if you wanted us—I thought perhaps you had forgotten about us coming," whispered Floss.

"No wonder," said auntie; "but Flossie, darling, I haven't got any letter to say what day you were coming? That was why we were not at the station. Sybil and I had been making such delightful plans about how we should meet you at the station—do you think your father and mother could have forgotten to write to tell me the day?"

"Oh no," said Floss, "I know papa wrote to tell you—he wrote the day before yesterday, for I heard him tell mamma so. And this morning when the post came, just as we were leaving, he wondered a little that there was no letter from you, but he said perhaps you hadn't thought it worth while to write, as you had said any day this week would do for us to come."

"Of course I would have written," said auntie; "but what can have become of the letter?"

It had evidently gone astray somehow, and that very evening the mystery was explained, for the postman brought it—a very travel-worn letter indeed, with two or three scrawls across it in red ink—"Missent to Whitehurst," "Try Whitefield," etc., etc.

"Whenever a letter does go wrong, which certainly is not very often, it is sure to be one of consequence," said auntie. But long before the letter came Floss and Carrots had forgotten their troubles—at least if they hadn't it was not auntie's fault, for I can't tell you how kind she was and what a fuss she made about them. She took them up to Sybil's nice beautiful warm nursery and all their wet things were taken off, and Floss was wrapped up in a dressing-gown of auntie's and Carrots in one of Sybil's, and then they had the most lovely tea you can imagine.

Sybil's father was away that night and was not coming back till the next day, and auntie was to have dinner alone, with Sybil beside her, you may be sure, to "keep her company," and help her to get through dinner by opening her little mouth for "tastes" every now and then. But auntie had to manage alone, after all, for of course Sybil would not leave Floss and Carrots, and auntie sent up the very nicest things from the dining-table for the children to eat with their tea, and Sybil did get some "tastes," I can assure you.

And they laughed at each other in the dressing-gowns, and Floss quite forgot that she had expected to feel shy and strange. Only when auntie came up to the nursery again after dinner and made Floss tell her all about the long walk in the cold and the dark, and about the "kind porter," and the oldish-looking lady, and, further back still, about the leaving home in the morning and how poor mamma kissed them "so many, many times"—Floss could not help crying again a little, nor could auntie either. And though Carrots and Sybil did not cry, their little faces looked very solemn and as if they almost thought they should cry, as they sat side by side on the rug in front of the high nursery guard, Carrots in the funny red-flannel dressing-gown which made him look so "old fashioned," and Sybil in her white embroidery and rose ribbons, crumpling them all up "anyhow" in a way which really went to Floss's heart, though auntie did not seem to mind.

Then came bed-time. Such a nice bed-time, for auntie had prepared for them two dear little rooms, with a door between, that they should not feel far away from each other. And though it was the very first time in Carrots' life that he had gone to bed without kind old nurse to tuck him up, he did not feel unhappy, for Floss reminded him what a good thing it was that their mother had nurse with her now she was ill, and besides, Sybil's French maid Denise was very kind and merry, and not at all "stuck up" or grand.

And the waking the next morning!

Who does not know those first wakings in a strange place! Sometimes so pleasant, sometimes so sad, but never, I think, without a strange interestingness of their own. This waking was pleasant, though so strange. The sun was shining for one thing—a great thing, I think I should call it, and the children felt it to be so.

They woke about the same time and called out to each other, and then Floss got out of bed and went to see how Carrots was looking, after all his adventures.

"You haven't caught cold I hope, Carrots," she said in a motherly tone.

"Oh no. I'm quite well," replied Carrots, "I haven't even a cold in my nose. And isn't it a nice morning, Floss, and isn't this a lovely room?"

"Yes," said Floss, "and so is mine, Carrots."

"And auntie is kind, isn't she, Floss?"

"Oh, very," said Floss.

"Isn't it nice to see the sun?" said Carrots. "Floss, I can't understand how it can always be the same sun, however far we go."

"But don't you remember what I showed you," said Floss, "about the world being like a little ball, always going round and round a great light, so of course the great light must always be the same?"

"Yes," said Carrots dreamily, "but still it seems funny. Will mamma see the sun at that nice warm place over the sea?"

"Why of course," said Floss, "it's the sun that makes that place nice and warm."

"Is it?" said Carrots. "Is that place nearer the sun than Sandyshore is, Floss?"

"No, not exactly. At least it is in a sort of a way—the sunshine falls straighter on it, but I couldn't explain without a globe and a lot of fuss," said Floss. "Never mind just now, Carrots—perhaps auntie can show you."

"But Floss," persisted Carrots, "I do want to know one thing. Shall we see the sun in heaven?"

"No," said Floss decidedly, "certainly not. It says in the Bible there will be no sun or moon in heaven."

"Then I don't think I shall like it at all," said Carrots, "for there won't be any sea there either. I can't think how it can be a nice place."

"But Carrots, dear," said Floss in some distress, "you mustn't think of heaven that way. It isn't like that. Heaven isn't like a place exactly, mamma says. It is just being quite good."

"Being quite good," repeated Carrots thoughtfully. "I wish I could be quite good, Floss, I wish everybody could, don't you?"

"Yes," said Floss. "But really you must get up, Carrots dear; that will be good for just now. Being good always comes in little bits like that."

"But in heaven, the being good will be all in one great big piece, that's how it will be, isn't it?" said Carrots, as he got out of bed and began hunting for his slippers.

I cannot tell you half the history of that first day at Greenmays, or of many others that followed. They were very happy days, and they were full of so many new pleasures and interests for Carrots and Floss that I should really have to write another book to tell you all about them. Everybody was kind to the children, and everything that could be thought of to make them feel "at home" was done. And Greenmays was such a pretty place—Carrots could hardly miss his dear old sea, once he had learnt to make friends with the hills. At first he could do nothing but gaze at them in astonishment.

"I didn't think hills were so big, or that they would have so many faces," he said to Floss and Sybil the first morning when they were out in the garden together.

Sybil burst out laughing. "Oh you funny Carrots!" she said; "you're just like a boy in a fairy story—you've got such queer fancies."

"But they're not fancies, Sybil," said Carrots, gravely, turning his great brown eyes on his cousin. "The hills have got lots of different faces: that one up there, the one with the round knobby top, has looked quite different several times this morning. First it looked smiley and smooth, and then it got all cross and wrinkly, and now it looks as if it was going to sleep."

Sybil stared up at the hill he was pointing to. "I see what you mean," she said; "but it's only the shadows of the clouds."

"That's pretty," said Carrots: "who told you that, Sybil? I never thought of clouds having shadows."

"Nobody told me," said Sybil; "I finded it out my own self. I find out lots of things," she continued, importantly. "I dare say it's because of my name—papa says my name means I should find out things, like a sort of a fairy, you know."

"Does it?" said Carrots, in a rather awe-struck tone. "I should like that. When you were little, Sybil," he continued, "were you ever frightened of shadows? I was."

"No," said Sybil, "I only thought they were funny. And once papa told me a story of a shadow that ran away from its master. It went across the street, at night, you know, when the lamps were lighted: there were houses opposite, you see, and the shadow went into such a beautiful house, and wouldn't come back again!"

"And what after that?" said both Floss and Carrots in a breath.

"Oh, I can't tell it you all," said Sybil; "you must ask papa."

"Does he often tell you stories?" asked Floss.

"Bits," said Sybil; "he doesn't tell them all through, like mother. But he's very nice about answering things I ask him. He doesn't say 'you couldn't understand,' or 'you'll know when you're older,' that horrid way."

"He must be nice," said Floss, who had secretly been trembling a little at the thought of the strange uncle.

And he did turn out very nice. He was older than Floss had expected; a good deal older than auntie, whom he sometimes spoke to as if she were quite a little girl, in a way which amused the children very much. At first he seemed very quiet and grave, but after a while Floss found out that in his own way he was very fond of fun, and she confided to auntie that she thought he was the funniest person she had ever seen. I don't know if auntie told him this, or if he took it as a compliment, but certainly he could not have been offended, for every day, as they learnt to know him better, the children found him kinder and kinder.

So they were very happy at Greenmays, and no doubt would have gone on being so but for one thing. There came bad news of their mother.

This was how they heard it. Every week at least, for several weeks, Floss or Carrots, and sometimes both, got a letter from their mother or from Cecil and Louise; and at first these letters were so cheerful, that even the little bit of anxiety which the children had hardly known was in their hearts melted away.

"What a good thing mamma went to that nice warm place, isn't it, auntie?" Carrots used to say after the arrival of each letter, and auntie most heartily agreed with the happy little fellow. But at last, just about Christmas-time, when the thin foreign-looking letter, that the children had learnt to know so well, made its appearance one morning on the breakfast-table, it proved to be for auntie—that, of course, they did not object, to, had there been one for them too, but there was not!

"Auntie dear, there is no letter for us," said Floss, when auntie came into the room. "Will you please open yours quick, and see if there is one inside it?"

"I don't think there is," said auntie; "it doesn't feel like it."

However, she opened the letter at once. No, there was no enclosure; and Floss, who was watching her face, saw that it grew troubled as she ran her eyes down the page.

"My letter is from your father. I cannot read it properly till after breakfast, for uncle is waiting for me to pour out his coffee. Run off now, dears, and I'll come to the nursery and tell you all about it after breakfast," she said, trying to look and speak just the same as usual.

But Floss saw that she was trying; she did not persist, however, but took Carrots by the hand, and went off obediently without speaking, only giving auntie one wistful look as she turned away.

"What's wrong, Florence?" said Sybil's father, as the door closed after the children.

"It is about Lucy," said auntie; "she is much worse; very ill indeed. She has caught cold somehow, and Frank seems almost to have lost hope already."

Two or three tears rolled down auntie's face as she spoke. For a minute or two Sybil's father said nothing.

"How about telling the children?" he asked at last.

"That's just it," replied auntie. "Frank leaves it to me to tell them or not, as I think best. He would not let Cecil or Louise write, as he thought if it had to be told I had better do so as gently as I could, by word of mouth. But they must be told—they are such quick children, I believe Floss suspects it already. And if—and if the next news should be worse," continued auntie with a little sob, "I would never forgive myself for not having prepared them, and they would be full of self-reproach for having been happy and merry as usual. Floss would say she should have known it by instinct."

"Would they feel it so much?—could they realise it? They are so young," said Sybil's father.

Auntie shook her head. "Not too young to feel it terribly," she said. "It is much better to tell them. I could not hide the sorrow in my face from those two honest pairs of eyes, for one thing."

"Well, you know best," said her husband.

A sad telling it was, and the way in which the children took it touched auntie's loving heart to the quick. They were so quiet and "pitiful," as little Sybil said. Floss's face grew white, for, with a child's hasty rush at conclusions, she fancied at first that auntie was paving the way for the worst news of all.

"Is mamma dead?" she whispered, and auntie's "Oh no, no, darling. Not so bad as that," seemed to give her a sort of crumb of hope, even before she had heard all.

And Carrots stood beside auntie's knee, clasping his little mother Floss's hand tight, and looking up in auntie's face with those wonderful eyes of his, which auntie had said truly one could not deceive; and when he had been told all there was to tell, he just said softly, "Oh poor mamma! Auntie, she kissened us so many times!"

And then, which auntie was on the whole glad of, the three children sat down on the rug together and cried; Sybil, in her sympathy, as heartily as the others, while she kept kissing and petting them, and calling them by every endearing name she could think of.

"When will there be another letter, auntie?" said Floss.

"The day after to-morrow," said auntie. "Your father will write by every mail."

In her own heart auntie had not much hope. From what Captain Desart said, the anxiety was not likely to last long. The illness had taken a different form from Mrs. Desart's other attacks. "She must be better or worse in a day or two," he wrote, and auntie's heart sorely misgave her as to which it would be.

The sorrowful day seemed very long to the children. They did their lessons as usual, for auntie told them it would be much better to do so.

"Would it please mamma?" said Carrots; and when auntie said "Yes, she was quite sure it would," he got his books at once, and "tried" even harder than usual.

But after lessons they had no heart to play, and there was no "must" about that. By bed-time they all looked worn out with crying and the sort of strange excitement there is about great sorrows—above all to children—which is more exhausting than almost anything.

"This will never do," thought auntie. "Hugh" (that was the name of Sybil's father) "will have reason to think I should have taken his advice, and not told them, if they go on like this."

"Sybil," she said, "Floss and Carrots will make themselves ill before the next letter comes. What can we do for them?"

Sybil shook her head despondently.

"I don't know, mother dear," she said; "I've got out all my best things to please them, but it's no good." She stood still for a minute, then her face lightened up. "Mother," she said, "'aposing you were to read aloud some of those stories you're going to get bounded up into a book some day? They would like that."

Floss hardly felt as if she could care to hear any stories, however pretty. But she did not like to disappoint kind auntie by saying so, especially when auntie told her she really wanted to know if she and Carrots liked her stories, as it would help her to judge if other children would care for them when they were "bounded up into a book."

So the next day auntie read them some, and they talked them over and got quite interested in them. Fortunately, she did not read them all that day, for the next day there was still more need of something to distract the children's sorrowful thoughts, as the looked-for letter did not come. Auntie would have liked to cheer the children by reminding them of the old sayings that "No news is good news," and "It is ill news which flies fast," but she dared not, for her own heart was very heavy with anxiety. And she was very glad to see them interested in the rest of the stories for the time.

I cannot tell you these stories, but some day perhaps you may come across the little book which they were made into. But there is one of them which I should like to tell you, as it is not very long, and in the children's mind it was always associated with something that happened just as auntie had finished reading it. For it was the last of her little stories, and it was called——

CHAPTER XII.

"THE TWO FUNNY LITTLE TROTS."