roached, they saw no sign of the artist, and
they were about to go up to the door when they heard a voice from one of
the open bedroom windows, and both stopped short as the words struck
their ears.

It was Mrs Drinkwater speaking, and her voice was half-choked with
sobs, so that her words were indistinct. But Will caught this--

"Don't, don't say more. I have nothing to forgive you. It is enough
for me that you are your own dear self again."

The boys stole away on tiptoe, Will saying, huskily: "We can't disturb
them now. Let's go and look at the broken dam."

Josh stopped short to peer into his companion's face.

"Can you stand it, Will?" he said.

The boy was silent for a few moments, and then, after making an effort
to clear his voice--

"Yes," he said, but very huskily. "Everybody has been saved, and I am
going to try and bear it like--well, like a man."

"Hooray!" cried Josh, softly. "But I say, what can have become of old
Manners?" And then, with a hearty laugh, "I say! Oh, just look there!"

He pointed in the direction of a verdant shelf overlooking the
clean-swept vale; and there, beneath his white umbrella, sat the object
of their search, calmly smoking his big black briar pipe, contemplating
the ruins of the dam and a small pile of stones, the only vestige of the
vanished mill.

"Why, here you are," cried Josh.

"Ah, boys," he said, sadly. "But you, Will, ought not you to be in
bed?"

"Bed?" cried the boy, scornfully. "What for? Josh lent me a suit of
his clothes, and I'm quite dry now."

"Oh, yes," said Manners; "so am I, but I feel as if I could make a
handkerchief precious wet by blubbering like a great, weak girl."

"Oh, don't worry about it," cried Will. "Think how we've all been
saved. Father's in the best of heart, and he says as soon as he's well
that he'll set to and build the whole place up bigger and better than it
was before."

"Yes," said Josh, "I heard him; and he said, too, that he could do it
with a better heart in his thankfulness that not a life was lost."

"Ah, yes," said Manners, sadly, "that's quite right, boys; but when you
came I wasn't thinking about that, but about my own loss."

"Oh," said Will. "You mean about the place being so spoiled?"

"No, I don't," said the artist, gruffly. "I was thinking about my
pictures--twelve canvases, a whole year's work, washed right away, dead,
as it were, and buried under some heap of stones. Ah, boys, they were