tive.

"How could you write letters to that Mr. Harkness?" asked Sophia, trying
to be patient.

"We didn't--exactly," said Blue, "but how did you know?"

"At least--we did," said Red, "but only notes. What have you heard,
Sister Sophia? Has he"--anxiously--"written to papa?"

"Written to papa!" repeated Sophia in scorn. "What should he do that
for?"

"I don't know," said Red, more dejected. "It's"--a little pause--"it's
the sort of thing they do."

Sophia drew in her breath with an effort not to laugh, and managed to
sigh instead. "I think you are the silliest girls of your age!"

"Well, I don't care," cried Blue, falling from bashfulness into a pout,
and from a pout into tears. "I _don't_ care, so now. I think he was much
nicer--much nicer than--" She sat upon a chair and kicked her little
toes upon the ground. Red's dimpled face was flushing with ominous
colour about the eyes.

"Really!" cried Sophia, and then she stopped, arrested by her own word.
How was it possible to present reality to eyes that looked out through
such maze of ignorance and folly; it seemed easier to take up a sterner
theme and comment upon the wickedness of disobedience and secrecy. Yet
all the time her words missed the mark, because the true sin of these
two pretty criminals was utter folly. Surely if the world, and their
fragment of it, had been what they thought--the youth a hero, and their
parents wrongly proud--their action had not been so wholly evil! But how
could she trim all the thoughts of their silly heads into true
proportion?

"I shall have to tell papa, you know; I couldn't take the responsibility
of not telling him; but I won't speak till this press of work is over,
because he is so tired, so you can be thinking how you will apologise to
him."

Both Blue and Red were weeping now, and Sophia, feeling that she had
made adequate impression, was glad to pause.

Red was the first to withdraw her handkerchief from dewy eyes. Her tone
and attitude seemed penitent, and Sophia looked at her encouragingly.

"Sister Sophia"--meekly--"does he say in his letter where he is,
or--or"--the voice trembled--"if he's ever coming back?"

For such disconsolate affection Sophia felt that the letter referred to
was perhaps the best medicine. "I will read you all that he says." And
she read it slowly and distinctly, as one reads a lesson to children.

"Dear Eliza."

"He didn't think she was 'dear'" pouted Blue. "He told us she was 'r