the narration of that tragical afternoon’s doings. “When I come to think over it now, I don’t seem able to remember nothing but pails of water on all sides, water dashed here and there, for all the world as if there had been a fire. And then oh! good me, the shovel-fulls of brimstone, which well-nigh suffocated the life out of one. There, I do say, that with all the humming and the buzzing about one, and all the furious creatures as well, one felt for all the world as if one had been turned into a bee-hive oneself, with just a pair of boots on.

“OH! isn’t this fun, isn’t this fun?” cried Hubert and Marygold in one breath, as by way of winding up the afternoon at the Fair, the whole party gathered round a plentifully spread tea-table in the old fashioned parlour of the “Cygnet” Inn.

On the whole, the entertainment had been a glorious success.

The younger children had been given into Ruth’s special keeping, whilst the two elder boys went off with Mr. Busson, ostensibly to knock over cocoa-nuts and shoot at stuffed pigeons and share in various similar sports, which they considered suitable to their advanced age.

But though they returned with a cocoa-nut apiece, they each owned to having had a turn of the “galloping horses,” and more than one go in at the swings. To neither of these latter forms of entertainment were Ruth’s charges admitted. And though Hubert cast longing looks at the “merry-go rounds,” he soon forgot them for the other diversions which came in his way.

There was a wonderful performing dog, which could tell the days of the week; there was a big brown bear, that climbed a pole and danced a jig; and a gold fish, the size of a herring.

This prodigy, wonderful to relate, was reported to sing like a skylark—that is, if he had not “Happened to have caught a cold in his head on the way to Bramblehurst and lost his singing voice for the first time for over ten years.”

A marvellous peep-show, exhibiting all the principal cities of the world, with their “male and female celebrities, taking an airing in the handsomest streets,” proved a huge attraction to the children.

And after the peep-show, there was the lucky-bag, with its penny dips and marvellous possibilities.

Marygold drew a diamond brooch, and a box with the portrait of the Prince of Wales on it. Hubert got a knife and a pincushion the latter he intended to give to Diana; whilst Gaston drew a whistle and a shawl-pin, with a blue bead for its head, which he at once offered to Mrs. Busson.

Then there was the gingerbread-stall, with its strutting cocks and hens, its gilded elephants and almond-hearted knights and ladies, all very funny to look at, the children agreed, but nicer to look at than to eat.

Faith and Phoena invested in some baskets of doubtful durability, while Hubert made friends with a lame gipsy boy, from whom he bought a dozen washing pegs. These he thought, would make a suitable gift for Nellie, whom he had observed using these homely implements.

Whilst bargaining over the baskets, Phoena had kept a persistent look out for the traces of any waif or stray, who might be stowed away in one of the gaily painted vans, and was woefully disappointed to see none.

“You’re glad now, Gaston, that you came with us, aren’t you?” enquired Hubert as they sat down to tea.

“But yes, I am very glad,” was the cordial reply.

“Won’t Andrew and Di be sorry that they didn’t come,” said Phil, “when they hear all about it.”

“Rather,” said Jack, “I call it a stunning spree.”

“I wish,” said Jack, “that their wretched horses were fatter.”

“Do you think that they’re werry hungry?” asked Hubert, pausing in the act of attacking a plum bun.

“That poor thing out there looks like it,” answered Phil, pointing to a miserable white skeleton of a pony, tethered by the roadside.

Hubert put down his cake and looked at Mrs. Busson.

“Anything wrong with the bun, my dear?” she asked.

“No,” answered Hubert, “but may I give it to the poor horse?”

Hubert was very fond of cake, but the thought of anything within his reach that was hungrier than himself, always quenched his appetite.

“Bless your dear heart!” cried Mrs. Busson, “that mouthful of bun wouldn’t do the poor thing any good.” Then noting Hubert’s look of disappointment, she added, “But look here, when you’ve finished your tea, you go out to Busson in the yard and tell him from me to ask the ostler for sixpennyworth of oats, and then Master Jack’ll go across the Green with you, and Master Phil too, I daresay, and help you to give them to the poor pony.”

Charmed with this delightful prospect, Hubert finished his tea, with equal enjoyment and alacrity, and then all the party arose from the table to assist in the feeding of the poor white starveling.

And perhaps this closing scene was the brightest moment in all that long bright summer afternoon.

“My word! won’t he enjoy himself!” cried Jack, who under Busson’s directions had presented the feast of oats in a pail of water. “I bet it’s the first time in your life, you’ve ever had such a blow out, you wretched specimen.”

For Gaston had laid his cheek against the neglected creature’s dirty matted mane, and was stroking his untempting coat with hands as gentle and caressing as if he were fondling some faultlessly groomed, satin-coated pony.

“Oh! Gaston,” cried Fay, dragging him away, “he’s not fit to touch.”

“He’s so sad,” said Gaston, simply. There were tears in the boy’s big brown eyes.

“Oh! he won’t be sad now,” said Hubert, “Mr. Busson says that he will stop being hungry by the time he has eaten all those oats.”

“Ah! one is often sad, when one is not hungry,” said Gaston, slowly.

But no one heeded his last remark.

Ruth was running across the Green, to call them back to the Inn, at the door of which the Gaybrook van was standing already, with old Mr. Busson frantically waving his whip at the scattered party.

What a scramble there was to pack not only everyone, but everyone’s newly-acquired property, into the tilted waggon.

For though Jack and Phil went off in search of their ponies, they committed divers articles, such as cocoa-nuts, walking sticks, in great variety, a top or two, some brilliant green performing frogs of vast size, a rat-trap, a marvellous kite, a stuffed pigeon for target practice, to Fay and Phoena, for the safety of which they were to hold themselves responsible.

The homeward drive, through the long winding lanes, in the soft golden light of the westering sun, was very delightful, if less noisy than the morning drive had been.

“Oh! of course, you must put him down in the ledger of golden deeds,” Fay was saying, “for he wanted to help the poor and distressed by giving up his cake but I can’t see why Gaston should go in too.”

“Because,” said Phoena, slowly, “I think he was quite as kind.”

“Because he went and stroked that horribly dirty creature? Oh! I say that was very dirty of him.”

“I think it was rather grand,” said Phoena, “we only thought of comforting the poor pony’s body, but Gaston wanted to comfort his sad heart too. For instance, I should think it was much more noble to kiss a dirty old beggar-woman than to give her my dinner. I know at any rate, which I’d rather not do.”

“That’s true,” admitted Fay, “still I can’t understand Gaston, I don’t think he really is a bit kind-hearted; he couldn’t hate Andrew as he does, if he had a really good heart.”

“Of course it’s wrong to hate people,” said Phoena; “still, I’m sure many kind people can’t help it sometimes. But just because they are kind-hearted, they’d never be cruel to those they hate. I’m quite sure if Gaston had the chance, he would be quite as kind to Andrew as Jack or Phil would be, only he wouldn’t be kind so gladly.”

Fay shook her head. “When you’re as old as I am, Phoena,” she said, with her superior wisdom, “you’ll understand more the wickedness of ha—” But she broke off suddenly.

The sharp clatter of quick-trotting horse’s hoofs coming towards them, smote on their ears, and Mrs. Busson started forward with a cry.

“That’s Blackberry,” she said. “I know his trot. That means there’s mischief at home.”

In another minute, the stout black cob, ridden by one of the farm men, came in sight.

“John! John Honybun, what has happened?” shouted Mrs. Busson. “Where are you off to?”

“Doctor,” was the brief reply, whilst John made a clumsy but ineffectual attempt to rein in his flying steed.

A great consternation fell into the midst of that hitherto happy vanful. For full thirty seconds no one spoke at all, not indeed until Blackberry became lost to view round the corner of the long lane they were just leaving. Then poor Mrs. Busson wailed out—

“Please God it’s not the children.”

But Phoena, with lips grown white, leant over to whisper into Fay’s ear, “Don’t you remember we guessed that they were going to do something?”

The remainder of that drive was a very sorry affair.

Though Mr. Busson whipped his horses into a pace, which greatly astonished those sleek, slow-going animals, it seemed to all concerned as if the chimneys of the Farm would never come in sight. At length, however, the old van jolted up to the door, whence they had set out so merrily that morning.

“Please God it’s not the children,” repeated Mrs. Busson, as Libbie came flying to meet them at the open door.

“Oh! ma’am, oh! ma’am,” she cried, in piteous distress, “they’ve been and broken through into the bee-room!”

“But speak, woman, are the children hurt?” cried Mrs. Busson.

“That’s it, that’s it, ma’am! Miss Di’s been stung that venomous, that we’ve had to send off for the doctor. Manny’s got her into bed, and is doing her best for her, but she’s been most cruelly punished. As for her poor eyes, it’s my belief that she’ll never see out of them again. There, you can hear her screaming, she hasn’t left off, not for five seconds together.”

“And Andrew?” asked Faith, whilst Mrs. Busson and Ruth flew indoors.

WHAT the master did say, was far more terrible than even Libbie had imagined possible.

“You treat Busson properly,” his wife was wont to assert, “and give him his dues, and he’s as mild as buttermilk; but take liberties with him and his, and you’ll see what’s in him, then. Good me! he’d crumple up a stone wall as if it were brown paper, and snap a six-inch iron bar, like a cobweb!

“No, I do say, Busson hasn’t got his match in all the country round, either for good temper or bad, according as the fit is on him, for one way or the other.”

Unfortunately, on his return from the Fair, Mr. Busson did consider—small blame to him—that a very great liberty had been taken with his house. Consequently, he was promptly overtaken with the fit for “crumbling stone walls, and snapping iron bars.”

In plain English, Mr. Busson flew into a furious rage.

“Thank goodness,” sighed poor Mrs. Busson, “that Ruth has packed the girls off to their rooms for the night, whilst Busson was still out.” For he had remained in the yard to discharge his duties to the horses, and thus his return to the house, and his further initiation into the full extent of that afternoon’s doings had been delayed some time.

But as Fay and Phoena, cowered together in their bedroom, which was directly over the parlour, where the farmer was giving free vent to his anger, the drift, if not all the words, of his fierce displeasure, reached the two girls very distinctly.

Jack and Phil, following the farmer indoors, a few minutes later, after putting away their ponies, as they loved to do, beat a hasty retreat, though their untasted supper stood ready within their reach. They were in blissful ignorance as to the cause of the farmer’s rage, but a look from Mrs. Busson warned them that they were not wanted, and with the ready tact of good breeding, they had quickly vanished to their own quarters.

“Oh, I wish,” cried Phoena, “that Ruth, or Libbie, or someone would come and see us. It is getting so late, and it will be too dreadful it we have to wait till to-morrow morning without knowing any more.”

“Well, we can make out something for ourselves,” said matter-of-fact Faith. “For you can hear that Mr. Busson is evidently determined to turn us out to-morrow morning. Just listen, now.”

“Can’t turn ’em out, you, say,” Busson was roaring. “Can’t turn who I choose out of my own house! Well, I call that a pretty pair of walking boots. Don’t you make any mistake about it, Missus, out they’ll go, bag and baggage, neck and crop, leggins or no leggins, soon as ever the sun’s up to-morrow.”

Then came the sound of pleading in a low tone from Mrs. Busson.

This was speedily cut short by the farmer’s loud voice.

“Respect for Miss Agatha, indeed! Let her teach her young ’uns to show respect for my goods and chattels. Let her, I say, before they ever set foot under my roof again.”

Then, after a moment’s lull, the farmer raged on anew.

“Oh, Busson, Busson, let him be till the morning,” the girls heard Mrs. Busson entreating her husband, her voice shrill with alarm.

Evidently she was trying, by main force, to hold the infuriated man back. “It will be plenty soon enough to punish him to-morrow.”

Involuntarily, Phoena thought of the scenes they had so often enacted in their ogre games, where the pitiful ogress sought to gain time for the luckless victims.

But how far Mrs. Busson would have succeeded or not was doubtful, if, at that critical moment, the doctor had not appeared on the scene. His presence produced at once a comparative calm.

“I wonder if poor Di will soon be better,” said Phoena, as they heard Dr. Forbes going upstairs to Di’s room, whence her screams still came at very short intervals.

Libbie had put her to bed in another part of the house.

“Do you suppose that she really will be blind?” asked Faith. “Oh, how could she and Andrew have done such a thing!”

“I thought they were up to something,” said Phoena; “but I never thought, after all we had said about it, that they would have done that.”

“And I’m so sorry for poor Mrs. Busson,” said Fay, “it seems so hard that she should get such a scolding for our ill-doing.”

“Yes, and after she’d been giving us such a happy afternoon. What’s that?” added Phoena.

Before anyone could answer, the door opened, and Nanny appeared.

Grim as she looked, the girls greeted her gladly.

“Oh, Nanny, do tell us what’s happening,” they implored.

“Get back into your bed at once, Miss Marion, if you don’t want a slapping,” was the first utterance of the late nursery-tyrant; “you were never trained under me, or you would know better than to run about barefoot.”

And it was not till Marygold was tightly tucked into her bed, and the door closed behind her, with a recommendation to open it again if she dared, that Nanny would answer the elder girls’ questions.

“Suffering, indeed,” she said, “yes, I believe you, Miss Di is suffering. There, if you could see her now, it would cure you of wishing to meddle with what doesn’t concern you. It’ll be ever so long, the doctor says, before she’s quite over it. She’ll have to be kept shut up in a dark room for many days to come. The only wonder is, that she’s likely to recover at all.”

“Oh, poor, dear Di!” said Faith.

“Poor Di, indeed!” echoed Nanny, indignantly; “naughty Di, that’s what she is. But then, she and Master Andrew always were the most troublesome pair that you could find on a long summer’s day. It’s poor Mrs. Busson, I pity. A nice time she’s having with the farmer. He’s just beside himself with rage, and no wonder, either. A proper pig-stye they’ve made of all that part of his house. And if Joe Wintle hadn’t had a head on his shoulders, I can’t think where the mischief would have stopped.”

“No, and you never were meant to hear about it, either,” was the grim rejoinder, “if those children hadn’t been prying about as they had no right to have done, they wouldn’t have known anything of it, and all this terrible business would never have come to pass.”

“But when you say a bee-room,” asked Phoena, “do you mean a room full of bees? I thought bees were always kept out of doors.”

“Well, and so they always are,” said Nanny, “but that was the odd thing about this room. Years and years ago, so long ago, that no one can remember when, a swarm of bees took possession, first of the real roof over that room, and then of the false roof—that space, you know, between the outer and inner walls of the upper storey—till at last, they ended by invading the room itself. It was used, no doubt, as an odd sort of lumber room, never as a living room, for though it has a door and a chimney, there’s no proper window to it. Clouds of bees are always flying round the chimney, and very often swarms come from there. There must be thousands and thousands of bees at home in that room now. One gentleman, so Mrs. Busson told me, who was a visitor in this neighbourhood, and heard of the room, was very anxious to open it at his own risk and expense, for he was specially curious about bees and their ways, but the farmer wouldn’t hear of it being touched. He always vowed that it should never be disturbed in his time, as his father and grandfather had said before him.”

“Why, of course, the risk of such a thing must have seemed dreadful,” said Faith, in awe-struck tones.

“Risk! I should think so,” said Nanny, “there, as I said, if it hadn’t been for Joe Wintle, I don’t believe we’d any of us been left here.”

“Well, you see, those children had smashed in half the lower part of the door, so they had made a fine disturbance amongst all the bees they had dislodged, and they all came flying about like mad. So Joe, like a wise man, rushed down to the village, and got hold of a sheet of zinc, which he nailed right over the broken panel of the door. He put on his regular bee-dress first; then he fitted a thick shutter over the whole door, so there’s no likelihood now of any more bees escaping. But, oh, the hundreds and thousands that came buzzing out, at first, you wouldn’t believe. Every one of us got pretty nicely stung, I can tell you.”

“Were you badly hurt, Nanny?” asked Fay, politely.

“Of course I was, Miss Faith, but a blue-bag, and some sweet oil set me right. Poor Libbie was badly punished, her left hand is just a sight; she worked so hard to get Miss Di free.”

“I suppose Di and Andrew were dreadfully frightened when they found out what they had done?” enquired Phoena.

“If you’d heard their screams as we heard them down in the brew-house, you wouldn’t have much doubt of that. Both Libbie and I thought they must have set themselves on fire, and be calling out of the flames.”

“I suppose Di was dreadfully stung,” said Faith.

“I tell you that it was only a wonder that she didn’t die, then and there,” said Nanny, “what with the shock, and the pain. As it is, she hasn’t come to herself yet. But there, I repeat it, I don’t pity her, not as I do Mrs. Busson.”

“I suppose Mr. Busson takes a long time to get over things,” said Fay.

“Oh, but he won’t beat Andrew, will he, Nanny? You won’t let him,” implored Faith.

“I would let him, gladly, if I could,” was the merciless rejoinder—as a matter-of-fact, Nanny had taken effectual measures to prevent such a thing happening—“only I believe that it would break Mrs. Busson’s heart, if anyone laid a finger on him in her house, and I’m sure I don’t want her troubles added to.”

“But,” faltered Phoena, “shall we all be sent away to-morrow?”

“More than likely. All that is, but Miss Di. I shouldn’t be surprised if the farmer sends her to the nearest hospital. But now I must go back to her room; I’ve promised that I’ll sit up the night with her. And the sooner that you two get to bed, and out of the way of doing fresh mischief, the better. Good-night to you both.”

“Good-night, Nanny,” responded the girls. They were too dejected to resent the glaring injustice implied in her last sentence.

The next morning they woke with very heavy hearts.

“Won’t it be an awful disgrace, Phoena,” sighed Fay, “if we really are sent back to-day. What will mother say?”

“I shall be so sorry for Mrs. Busson,” said Phoena, “because, you see, she will be so sad if it all ends so badly. Perhaps the farmer has waked up in a better temper.”

“I rather hope he has,” chimed in little Marygold, “for I’m werry afraid of seeing him, if he’s still in that turkey-cock rage.”

Even Jack and Phil were unusually subdued.

They had heard the whole story from Joe Wintle, the hero of the zinc sheet, and they had heard also how Mr. Busson had vowed that every one of them was to be cleared off the premises that day.

“And Joe says that the farmer is a man of his word,” said Phil.

No one had seen Andrew. Jack had tried the door of his room, but had found it still locked.

“Poor beggar, he must be having a lively time of it,” said Phil.

“Serve him right,” said Jack, “it was a dirty trick to play.”

WELL knowing all that she had gone through for their sakes, the children felt terribly shy of meeting their hostess.

But, save that her face was a little pale, and that her eyelids showed narrow red rims, there was nothing in her quiet, pleasant greeting, no lack of warmth in her bright smile, to betray that anything had gone wrong with her.

For the first time, perhaps, in their lives, Fay and Phoena realised how much elder folk may suffer for the misdoings of the young, and how unselfishly they may conceal that suffering from its authors.

“Well, now, my dears,” she began, and there was a certain jerkiness in her tone now, which, to older ears would have told its own story, “I want you all to make an extra good breakfast, and I’ll tell you the reason why.”

Oh, then they were going to be sent away. Faith felt sure of that.

“We’re going to have such beautiful weather to-day,” Mrs. Busson went on—as if a fine day during that remarkably dry season were quite a novelty—“that I’ve thought of a little treat for you all.”

The elder girls breathed freely.

“And it’s this. You’ve often heard talk of the old oak at Barnby.”

“Under which Queen Elizabeth is said to have drunk a cup of cider?” asked Phoena, eagerly.

“Of course we should,” cried the children in chorus.

Phoena, noting the look of relief on Mrs. Busson’s face at the unanimous consent to her plan, guessed the old lady’s good reasons for arranging that they should be out of the house for that whole day.

“And now you’ll finish your breakfast nice and quietly,” besought Mrs. Busson, “and then you’ll just stop indoors out of the sun, till you are ready to start. The house is still topsy-turvy after yesterday’s upset, so we don’t want more little feet running about than can be helped. Besides, poor Miss Di must be kept quiet.”

“Is she better to-day?” asked Fay, timidly, feeling almost guilty in asking after one of the culprits.

“Not much, I’m afraid; she hasn’t had a wink of sleep.”

“And Andrew,” asked Jack, “will he come with us?”

“No, sir, that he certainly won’t,” said Nanny, appearing at the door, to fetch a cup of milk for Di, “Master Andrew’s got to stop at home to be punished, and a rare punishment we’ve thought out for him, too, Mr. Busson and I.”

Without another word, Nanny took the milk, and departed.

Mrs. Busson hurried after her.

“What a horrid old crab-stick,” cried Jack, “no wonder that you all hated her, when she was your nurse.”

“Small blame to Andrew that he didn’t want to see her again,” said Jack.

“I expect,” said Phoena, with her natural shrewdness, “that she has really been doing Andrew a kind turn, and that whatever the punishment may be, she only invented it to get Andrew off the merciless beating he seemed likely to get last evening.”

“It won’t be much fun,” said tender-hearted Marygold, “to go to our picnic, and not know all the time what dreadful things may be happening to Andrew.”

“Yes,” chimed in Hubert, “it does seem werry sad to leave him behind in disgrace, when we are going to enjoy ourselves.”

“He has no one to thank for it but himself,” said Phil. “No one asked him to go and kick up all this shine, and do us out of our supper last night. He ought to be licked for it.”

A little later, Jack was quite ready to endorse Phil’s opinion.

Forgetting Mrs. Busson’s directions as to staying indoors, Jack strayed round to the straw-yard, where he ran up against Mr. Busson.

Not heeding the signs of the times, Jack accosted the farmer—who had rather pointedly turned his back upon him—and asked if they might have the ponies.

The old man turned on him in a fury.

“Now, clear out of this,” he cried, seizing Jack by the ear, “I’ve told the missus, and I’ll tell you, that I’m not going to be walked over in my place by a parcel of ill-behaved youngsters.”

Therewith, he dragged Jack across the yard, pushing him through the gate, and slamming it after him with quite unnecessary violence.

“I’d like to kick Andrew,” said Phil, with more heartiness than heart.

“I think,” said Fay, “that you may leave Andrew to the tender mercies of Nanny and Busson. I expect that he’ll get all that he deserves.”

“I hope to goodness that he will,” said Philip, whose disappointment about the ponies made him very vengeance-thirsty.

“Well,” said Jack, gloomily, “he has made the farmer as cross as a bear with two sore heads.”

“I hope we’ll soon start now,” said Marygold, “I don’t want to see Mr. Busson, I don’t, at all.”

“Not much fear of your seeing him,” said Fay, “if you keep indoors, like a good little girl.”

But Faith proved a false prophet.

For, just as the children were thinking of setting off, the door opened, and Mr. Busson put his dreaded head in.

“Now, you little gentlemen and ladies,” he began, “just you come along with me, and see what comes of meddling with what does not belong to you. Never too late to learn, or too early, says I.”

These last words were aimed at Marygold, who was shaking with fear.

So a very subdued procession followed the farmer, as he strode down the garden, and across the fowl-yard to the orchard, beloved of Gaston.

On plodded Mr. Busson through the long, rank grass, till he reached nearly the middle of the orchard. Then he paused.

This recommendation was entirely superfluous, however.

Faith and Phoena were standing with eyes and mouth wide open, and fixed in a rigid stare, whilst Hubert and Marygold were backing like the traditional crabs.

“What is it? What is it?” they all asked.

“Why, it’s your brother, Andrew, doing penance, my dears,” said the farmer. “Take a nearer look at him.”

In the middle of the orchard was a big, artificial mound, surmounted by a flagstaff.

This table-mountain, as Phoena had christened it, had been described by Marygold, in a letter to her mother, as being “a mile high,” and affording a view “all over the country.”

As a matter of fact, it was about twenty feet high, and from its top you could command a good view of the lane, which ran alongside of the orchard. But though the surface of the mound was now so thickly overgrown with coarse weeds and grass, that to the unknowing it might almost appear a natural hillock, it was really entirely made up of broken brick-bats, and crockery, and all the other miscellaneous objects which go to form a rubbish heap. But it was a rubbish heap of ancient date, and of very literal long-standing.

It was this table mountain that Mr. Busson had selected as the theatre of Andrew’s punishment. A wide-bottomed tub, turned topsy-turvy, was set at the foot of the flag-staff, and in the middle of the tub was placed a chair, and on the chair was what appeared to be a monster straw bee-hive.

It was of the old-fashioned extinguisher shape, wide at the edge of the skirt—as the cottagers term it—whence three wooden legs projected, and tapering upwards into quite a narrow circumference round the neck.

A further decoration was added to the hat, in the shape of Libbie’s scorched and rent apron, which was spread over it after the fashion of those cloths which sometimes serve to protect hives from the undue heat.

“There now, don’t you call that a pretty picture, and all made with a truss of straw, and a good-for-nothing youngster?” asked the farmer, turning upon Jack and Phil, who were holding their sides with laughter, so absolutely ludicrous did Andrew appear.

“Go away, all of you, you nasty cowards,” howled Andrew, “if you were not such a sneaking lot, all of you, you would never let me be treated like this.”

“Oh, I say, none of your cheek, old bee-hive,” said Jack, “you chain up, after all the row you’ve kicked up for everyone.”

“I wish I’d kicked up ten times more,” snarled Andrew, “you’re all traitors and snea—”

“Look here, old straw-sides,” said Phil, “you’d better take your punishment meekly, or you may get something worse than that shied at you,” he added, flinging a pellet of grass, which he took care should only shave Andrew’s face.

“Get away with you, get away with you,” whimpered Andrew, “if you don’t go soon, I’ll—”

“Make your mind easy, my lad,” said Busson, “we’re all going away now, for it’s not everyone that is so mighty fond of bee-hive company as you. So just you bide nice and quiet there, until such time as I see fit to relieve you, and ponderate over your misdoings, that’s my advice to you. But, just remember, that, perched up aloft as you are, I can keep my weather eye on you from all over the place, so you’d better behave yourself, else it will be the worse for you, and for this here stick too, for it shall be broken in your service then, and no mistake,” and Busson’s laugh was not pleasant to hear. “Now, young ’uns, march off, and leave him to himself.”

“Oh, Andrew,” said Fay, screwing as close to him as she could, “are you very miserable?”

“Get away, I hate you all,” was the spiteful reply.

“Oh, please, Mr. Busson,” implored Faith, as they trooped out of the orchard, “you won’t leave Andrew very long up there; suppose he got very tired of standing up on that chair, and tumbled off.”

“No fear of that happening, missy,” said the farmer, who had worked off the worst part of his temper by now, “for before we put that comfortable straw jacket over him, we stood him up on the chair, and tied him pretty tightly to the back of it. Then, to make sure that the chair itself wouldn’t budge, we slipped a chain round the legs of it, and so made the chain taut to the flag-staff, so you see that it’s all been carefully arranged. I’ve told him that most likely he’ll be there till the sundown, but I’ll let him off, may be, in a couple of hours.”

“It must be disgustingly stuffy inside all that straw,” said Jack, “I’d sooner have had twenty lickings.”

“And I’d sooner have had forty than been made such a tom-fool of,” said Phil.

“Yes, but then you are not Andrew,” remarked Fay.

“Well, at any rate,” said Phoena, “I’m very glad that we know the worst of what is to happen to him, because now we needn’t feel so very selfish, going off to our picnic and not knowing what dreadful punishment Andrew might be undergoing all the time.”

“That’s true,” said Faith, “but where’s Gaston, I thought he started with us.”

“So he did,” said Phoena, “I expect he has gone round by the road, with Ruth, and the infants, and the donkey cart.”

“FAITH, Faith! Phoena! Marygold! Oh! Somebody come and release me, I can’t, I can’t bear this any longer! Oh! oh! how can you all leave me here alone? How can you, how can you?”

These dolorous plaints, repeated at very short intervals and interlarded with despairing howls, were kept up by Andrew, with praiseworthy persistency.

But so far as any visible result was concerned, he might as well have held his peace. His cries fell apparently only on the apple trees around him, and the grass at his feet.

“Oh! do somebody help me, do somebody help me,” he implored afresh, as the clock struck twelve, “I’ve been here for such hours.”

He had been there for nearly two whole ones. For it was a little past ten when Mr. Busson, with his assistant Ned—who had thoroughly enjoyed the job—had completed the new sort of bee-hive, and gone in search of spectators.

This time, Andrew bellowed so loudly that he did bring Mr. Busson on to the scene.

“Now look here, sonny,” he said, “I told you to keep quiet, didn’t I? What do you mean then by carrying on this way? Chances are I’d have let you out, if you’d behaved yourself, but I shan’t now, you’ll have to bide there, till sun-down or moon-rise, may be, if I hear any more of that hollering.”

“She ain’t here, Master,” said Polly, the odd girl.

“Well, you’ll do. Just you tell her that I’ve gone to the sale over at Warren’s, but say that I leave it to her to look after that young master down in the orchard. If he keeps pretty quiet, she can let him out in another hour, but not any sooner, mind you that.”

“All right, Master,” said Polly, “I don’t expect that Libbie will be in much of a hurry about it, the longer he is kept out of mischief the better, she will think.”

“Well, remember to tell her, any way.”

“Oh! I’ll remember,” said Polly, and straightway forgot all about it.

And little wonder! Presently no one in the household—not even Mrs. Busson who had wept over Andrew’s punishment; not even Nanny, who had so carefully planned it—had a thought to bestow on the culprit in the orchard.

For Dr. Forbes had paid his visit, and his verdict on Diana’s condition had filled everyone with grief and dismay. She was so much worse after her restless, suffering night, and her temperature was so high, that it was impossible to say if she would recover from the effect of the terrible shock that her whole system had sustained.

At any rate, Mrs. Durand must be summoned at once.

“Lose no time in wiring for her,” the doctor had said, as he left, promising to return towards evening.

“Poor lady, poor Miss Agatha,” sighed Mrs. Busson, “to think of all the trouble she has had already, losing the Colonel when Miss Marygold wasn’t out of long clothes, and then for this to happen now, and to think that she’s away in Edinburgh, and that she can’t get here before to-morrow morning at earliest.”

“That child has never been left all this time in the orchard,” she cried, rushing back into the house. “Surely someone has seen to him.”

“Oh! good me!” exclaimed conscience-stricken Polly, “I clean forgot to tell Libbie to let him go, and now it’s past six.”

“Why the poor lad must be half dead,” cried Mrs. Busson, “fly to him Polly, do.”

Polly’s flight was a short one. In the backyard she met Ned.

“No need to trouble about he,” said Ned, “the master let him out I believe before he started. He’s down in the strawberry beds, as you can see for yourself,” added Ned, putting aside some thick growing privet bushes, and pointing in the direction of the kitchen garden.

There sure enough was Andrew, cowering under the shelter of a big fir tree, which grew against the wall in a corner of the strawberry beds.

“He’s mighty ashamed of himself, for he’s doing his best to hide,” laughed Polly, as she ran back to relieve Mrs. Busson’s fears.

“Well, that is a comfort to be sure,” sighed the poor old lady, “and now, mind Polly when the other children come home, don’t say one word about poor Miss Di. The doctor says that there won’t be much change to be looked for till to-morrow, and there’ll be no good done by telling the poor dears the worst till one’s obliged. They needn’t know till to-morrow that we’ve sent for Miss Di’s mamma.”

“What has become of Andrew?” they asked, after their first questions about Di had been answered with suitable vagueness.

“Oh! he’s all right,” said Libbie, “I saw him an hour ago, he came to the larder and helped himself to a meat pasty and a bun. He didn’t think that anyone saw him, but I let him go, for it was natural enough that he should feel shame-faced.”

“Beastly mean of him though, to steal from the larder,” said Phil.

“Poor beggar, I expect he was hungry,” said the more merciful Jack.

“I wonder if he’ll come to supper,” speculated Hubert.

“Here he comes,” said Phoena, as Andrew, emboldened by a call from Libbie, stole out from his hiding place, and came rather sheepishly to take his place at the supper-table.

“Where’s Gaston?” asked Faith, “where has he been all day, Libbie?”

“Why, surely,” answered Libbie, who was coming in with a dish, “he has been along with you all? He started with you.”

“Yes, but he very soon ran home again,” said Faith.

“He didn’t run back here,” said Libbie, “we’ve seen nothing of him all day.”

“But then where did he have his dinner and tea?” asked Phil, in consternation. “Mrs. Busson,” as the latter came into the room, “What has become of Gaston, no one has seen him since this morning?”

“Why, Andrew, how red you’ve got!” cried Jack, suddenly.

“Yes, you are red,” echoed several voices, whilst all eyes were turned on Andrew’s guilty face. “Oh! you know something about Gaston, that’s quite clear.”

“I asked—no—he wanted,” faltered Andrew, “at least I went to look through the bushes, a long, long time ago and it was gone, he must—”

“Oh! I guess,” cried Phoena, and in another minute she had dashed out of doors, across the garden, and on to the orchard, with all the others following her.

Yes, Andrew was right! It had gone! There was no monster bee-hive to be seen on the empty chair in the middle of the table mountain.

Only a cry of great dismay rang out on the still evening air, as Phoena was seen to sink on her knees and half disappear in the high grass.

For there at the foot of the hillock, a heap of straw lay motionless, whilst from under the straw, Gaston’s little face, ghastly and drawn with suffering, looked out.

“Gaston! dear, dear little Gaston, do speak,” implored Phoena.

The lips moved, but no sound came from them.

“Do you see,” cried Phoena, her eyes flashing indignantly through her tears, as she turned to follow Ruth and Libbie, who between them were tenderly carrying Gaston indoors, “do you see Andrew must have put him up there and got off himself.”

“Did you, Andrew, did you?” asked the boys, closing round their cousin, who was making an attempt to run away.

For Mr. Busson had seized Andrew by the arm and was brandishing his stick over his head.

“Well if ever I saw such a poor mean-spirited creature,” he cried. “There, take him you boys and give him a sound thrashing between you,” and with a rough shake, the farmer pushed Andrew towards his cousins.

But both Jack and Phil fell back from Andrew, as if by common consent.

“WELL, now my dear Faith, do tell me as clearly as you can what has happened. I find poor Di dangerously ill, and Andrew shut up in deep disgrace, and I hear that all through Andrew’s fault, the little French boy has broken his leg very badly. And whenever I ask for an explanation, it all seems to begin and end with a bee-room and a bee-hive. What does it all mean?”

It was poor Mrs. Durand who spoke.

She was tired out by her hurried journey from the North, and shocked by the disturbed condition in which she found Gaybrook Farm and all its inmates, and was really at her wit’s ends to comprehend what chain of events could have resulted in these dire consequences.

“It all happened in this way,” began Faith, with a heavy sigh. “Di found out that there was a mysterious door in the house, which no one had opened for about a hundred years. And as nobody would satisfy her curiosity as to what was in the room, and why it had been left closed so long, she determined to discover it for herself. So she and Andrew agreed to force open the door, and they chose the day when we had all gone to the fair to do it.”

“And that door belonged to the bee-room, I suppose,” said Mrs. Durand.

“And you mean to tell me that those naughty children broke into that room,” cried Mrs. Durand. “No wonder such terrible results followed.”

“Indeed, they were terrible,” said Faith. “Poor Libbie will talk of that afternoon for the rest of her life, I am sure. And oh, mother, you can’t think how angry the farmer was, and what a bad time poor Mrs. Busson has had in consequence. That was why we thought that, after all, Andrew was very lucky to get off with no worse punishment than being dressed up in a monster bee-hive, and tied up to the flag-staff on the top of the mound in the orchard. Of course, it was dreadful to be made such a laughing stock to everyone, and it must have been very tiring and disagreeable altogether,” went on Fay, entering more fully into various details of Andrew’s form of punishment; “but,” she wound up, “though it was hard on Andrew to be forgotten, and left to himself, it was too mean of him to make poor little Gaston stand up there in—”

“Oh, but Gaston did offer,” broke in Phoena; “at least, this is what I make out happened from Gaston. He felt so sorry for Andrew, left behind in such dreadful disgrace, that he ran back from us, and went and hid in his favourite ditch, so that he might be within speaking distance of Andrew, and yet not be seen. Then it seems that when Andrew went on crying out so, and imploring that somebody would come and take his place, only just to keep the straw erection upright and visible, whilst he rested,—because, you see,” explained Phoena, “Mr. Busson said, if he saw Andrew move, he would beat him—Gaston came out of his ditch, and offered to help him.”

“Then did Gaston take his place in the bee-hive?” asked Mrs. Durand, “and so set Andrew free?”

“And didn’t Andrew keep his word?”

“No,” said Phoena, “instead of minutes, he left Gaston standing there hour after hour, for he would not break his promise—Gaston wouldn’t, I mean,—till at last, worn out with weariness, and want of food, he fell off the chair, and broke his leg.”

“You see,” explained Faith, “Gaston wasn’t tied to the back of the chair, as the farmer had been careful to tie Andrew, so that he might have a support at his back; for when Gaston had set him free, Andrew was only in such a hurry to get off himself, that he did nothing for Gaston. So poor Gaston had nothing to lean against. Oh, mother, I am ashamed of Andrew, I am ashamed of him,” wound up poor Fay, tearfully.

“The boys say that they will never speak to him again,” said Phoena.

“None of you will have the chance of doing so for some time to come,” said Mrs. Durand; “for I had already arranged for him to go to a tutor, in Edinburgh, where I hope he will be taught better ways, and now I shall telegraph to Sarah to come and fetch him away this very afternoon, and keep him with her at home, till I can settle for his journey north. It will depend on his behaviour there, if I allow him to come home at Christmas.”

“It is indeed,” said Mrs. Durand, “and though he hopes now, that by God’s mercy she may recover, Dr. Forbes says that it will be long before Di is quite well again. She has had a sharp lesson for her disobedience, which she will never forget all her life. And now, children, as regards poor, dear little Gaston, we must all think what we can do for him,” added Mrs. Durand.

“He’ll have to have the golden prize,” cried Hubert, coming into the room, so as to catch the last words, “for we all agreed, didn’t we? that the one who did the unselfishest thing, and the thing that hurt themselves the most, should be called the bestest of them all.”

*   *  *  *  *  *   *  *  

The pride of the summer was gone, as Mrs. Busson termed it. The harvest fields had been cleared, and the apple-gathering was about to begin, when the grand feast, which was to celebrate the achievements of the Knights of the Order of Good Intentions, was at last held.

Matters had turned out very differently from what they had expected, when the children had first planned it all.

Andrew was away in disgrace, and Gaston, though he made a brave show of being well again, was still on crutches, whilst as to Diana, with her white face, and closely-shaven head, she looked like nothing but a thin, pale ghost of the merry “scarlet-runner” of the earlier summer days. If the truth must be told, Di, who had not distinguished herself, especially either by her patience or gentleness during her illness, was never heard again to jeer about “pillow-case saints.”

For to Gaston’s great joy, his favourite uncle was coming the next day to take him back to France, and the others were all leaving for home by the morning train.

To all, the end of their eventful visit to Gaybrook had come.

Of course, Gaston was the hero of the day.

Ever since his accident, the children had vied with each other in making much of him, whilst Jack and Phil had delighted Gaston beyond words, by declaring that there was not a fellow in their school who would have stuck more pluckily to his guns than Gaston had stuck to his bee-hive.

“And you are glad that you have won the golden prize, aren’t you, Gaston; werry glad?” said Marygold,—she had claimed to sit next to him at the feast—“and you will be ever so proud to show it to your uncle.”

“Ah, but,” broke in Hubert, “you don’t know everything yet,” and he and Marygold laughed mysteriously.

For before that day was done, there was another surprise in store for Gaston. Another gift was to crown that proud day.

This was revealed, when, at the end of the banquet, all the boys suddenly disappeared, and all the girls became too excited to be able to answer clearly Gaston’s questions as to the boys’ movements.

Presently they re-appeared, scampering across the paddock, Jack and Phil leading a little Welsh pony between them, with Hubert perched on its back.

“For it’s saddled, and bridled, and shod, you see,” cried Marygold, dancing round Gaston in wild delight, “and though it’s not much bigger than Dragon, the watch-dog, it’s dreffully strong, and goes very fast.”

Gaston was beside himself with joy and astonishment.

Ever since he had seen the boys ride, the possession of a pony had been the theme of his wildest dreams, and now he could hardly trust his eyes and ears. It seemed as if the fairies, he still loved to believe in, had brought him the fulfilment of his dearest wish, straight from fairyland.

The weeks at Gaybrook had been mostly sad and sorrow-stained, but now this one golden day would gild all his memories of the English farm for ever.

“But, but,” he cried, “who gives it me, who did think of it?”

“We have all joined together to get it for you,” said Phil, “infants and all.”

“And Andrew sent all his year’s savings out of the bank,” said Faith.

“Poor Andrew,” said Gaston, deeply touched, “but—but how came the idea to your heads, how came it then?”

“How did you get the idea to help Andrew?” laughed Di.

“Oh, but that was quite different,” said Gaston, “that came, because I did know so exactly, oh, so very exactly, what he was feeling.”

“But then,” asked Marygold, in genuine astonishment, “but then, Gaston, had you ever been tied up in a bee-hive?”

“No,” said Gaston, simply, “but I had been lonely, too.”