all
so badly."

"My jiggery!" Bunty said.

"I've thought it all out," Judy continued, pushing back her hair
in a weary moray. "I can't quite remember everything just now,
I am so tired, but everything will be all right."

"But what'll he say?" Bunty said with frightened eyes, as a
vision of his father crossed his mind.

"He won't know, of course," Judy returned, in a matter-of-fact
manner. "I shall just live here in this loft for a time, and
you can all come to see me and bring me food and things, and then
presently I'll go back to school." She sank down among the straw
and shut her eyes in an exhausted way for a minute or two, and
Bunty watched her half fascinated.

"How far is it from your school?" he said at last.

"Seventy-seven miles." Judy shuddered a little. "I got a lift
in a luggage train from Lawson to Springwood, and a ride in a cart
for a little way, but I walked the rest. I've been nearly a week
coming," she added after a pause, and shut her eyes again for quite
a long time. Then a tear or two of weakness and self-pity trickled
from beneath her black lashes, and made a little clean mark down her
cheeks. Bunty's throat swelled at the sight of them, he had never
seen Judy cry as long as he could remember. He patted her thin
hand, he rubbed his head against her shoulder, and said, "Never
mind, old girl," in a thick voice.

But that brought, half a dozen great heavy drop hurrying down from
beneath the closed lashes, and the girl turned over and lay face
downwards to hide them. Then she struggled up to a sitting position
and actually began to laugh.

"IF the Miss Burtons could see me!" she said. "Oh, I've managed
everything so beautifully; they think I'm spending a fortnight at
Katoomba--oh, BUNTY, you ought to see the curls Miss Marian Burton
wears plastered at each side of her cheeks!" She broke off,
laughing almost hysterically, and then coughing till the tears came
back in her eyes.

"Do go and get me something to eat," she said crossly, when she got
her breath--"you might remember I've had nothing to eat since
yesterday morning; only you always were selfish, Bunty."

He got up and moved away in a great hurry. "What could you eat?
what shall I get?" he said, and put one leg down the trap-door.

"Anything so long as it's a lot," she said--"ANYTHING!--I feel I
could eat this straw, and crunch up the beams as if they were
biscuits. I declare I've had to keep my eyes off you, Bunt