!" cried Dick, gathering his
belongings together, so as to be ready to leap out when the train
stopped, while a porter went shouting up and down the platform, "Lakely!
Lakely!"

"Well, good-bye, little friend; mind, Cherton comes next, then 'twill be
your turn to turn out." He wrung her hand, and was out on the platform
in a twinkle, loaded like a bee, happy as a boy.

"I say, Miss Inna, I should like you to come over to our place to see
Jenny, or Trapper. I shall ask the doctor to give you a lift over in his
gig," he put his head back into the carriage to say.

Now he was scudding away down the platform, and claiming a trunk and
portmanteau from a medley of luggage, had it set aside by the porter,
who seemed to know him; this done, he darted back again, smiled in at
the carriage window, where that sweet girlish face still watched him,
and then vanished.

CHAPTER II.

WILLETT'S FARM--TEA IN THE DINING-ROOM.

"Cherton! Cherton! Cherton!"

Inna sprang from the corner of her lonely carriage, and stepped out upon
the platform, helped by the kindly guard.

"Now, my dear, what's to be done? There's nobody here waiting for you,
as I see," said the man, looking up and down the small platform, where
she seemed to be the only arrival--she and her neat little trunk, which
a porter brought and set down at her feet.

"No, they don't know I'm coming," returned the child, with a sober shake
of her head.

"Where for, miss?" inquired the porter, as the guard looked at him.

"My--Mr. Willett's, at Willett's Farm," said Inna, in a sort of startled
importance at having to speak for herself.

"Do you know the way?" asked the man.

"No; but I should if you told me--I mean----"

"Yes, miss; I know what you mean," replied the porter, noting her
childish confusion. "I'll see to her, and send her safely," he promised
the busy guard, and took her small gloved hand in his, and led her away
out into the open road by the station, stretching away among fields, all
bathed in crimson and golden sunshine.

"Now, miss," said he, pointing with his finger, "you go along this road
and turn to your right, and along a lane, turn to your right, and along
another; don't turn to your left at all; then turn to your right again,
and there you are at Willett's Farm. Do you understand?" he asked
kindly, bending down to something like her height, so as to get her view
of the way.

"Yes, thank you; I must keep to the right all the way, and