the
church we went to, with someone kneeling. And this is meant for the
'English Grundys,' looking at someone who is coming in very late with an
alpenstock--only, I am better at the 'English Grundys' than at the
person with the alpenstock. I wish I were the 'English Grundys' now,
still in the Tyrol. I hope I shall get a letter from you soon; and that
it will say you are getting ready to come back. My guardian will be
awfully keen for you to come and stay with us. He is not half bad when
you know him, and there will be his sister, Mrs. Doone, and her daughter
left there after the wedding. It will be simply disgusting if you and
Mr. Stormer don't come. I wish I could write all I feel about my lovely
time in the Tyrol, but you must please imagine it."

And just as he had not known how to address her, so he could not tell how
to subscribe himself, and only put "Mark Lennan."

He posted the letter at Exeter, where he had some time to wait; and his
mind moved still more from past to future. Now that he was nearing home
he began to think of his sister. In two days she would be gone to Italy;
he would not see her again for a long time, and a whole crowd of memories
began to stretch out hands to him. How she and he used to walk together
in the walled garden, and on the sunk croquet ground; she telling him
stories, her arm round his neck, because she was two years older, and
taller than he in those days. Their first talk each holidays, when he
came back to her; the first tea--with unlimited jam--in the old
mullion-windowed, flower-chintzed schoolroom, just himself and her and
old Tingle (Miss Tring, the ancient governess, whose chaperonage would
now be gone), and sometimes that kid Sylvia, when she chanced to be
staying there with her mother. Cicely had always understood him when he
explained to her how inferior school was, because nobody took any
interest in beasts or birds except to kill them; or in drawing, or making
things, or anything decent. They would go off together, rambling along
the river, or up the park, where everything looked so jolly and wild--the
ragged oak-trees, and huge boulders, of whose presence old Godden, the
coachman, had said: "I can't think but what these ha' been washed here by
the Flood, Mast' Mark!" These and a thousand other memories beset his
conscience now. And as the train drew closer to their station, he
eagerly made ready to jump out and greet her. There was the honeysuckle
full