about anything else. Poor mother! She's had such a time
with father; he's one of the most serious of all the Brethren and never
has time to think about any of us. Then he's in a bank all the week,
where he can't think about God much because he makes mistakes about
figures if he does, so he has to put it all into Sunday. We will be
friends, won't we?"

It came to Maggie with a strange ironic little pang that this was the
first time that any one had asked for her friendship.

"Of course," she said.

Miss Smith's further confidences were interrupted by the aunts and
behind them, to Maggie's great surprise, Mr. Warlock and his son. The
sudden descent of these gentlemen upon the still lingering echoes of
Miss Caroline Smith's critical and explanatory remarks embarrassed
Maggie. Not so Miss Smith. She kissed both the aunts with an emphasis
that they apparently appreciated for they smiled and Aunt Anne laid her
hand affectionately upon the girl's sleeve. Maggie, watching, felt the
strangest little pang of jealousy. That was the way that she should
have behaved, been warm and demonstrative from the beginning--but she
could not.

Even now she stood back in the shadows of the room, watching them all
with large grave eyes, hoping that they would not notice her.

With Mr. Warlock and his son also Miss Smith seemed perfectly at home,
chattering, laughing up into young Warlock's eyes, as though there were
some especial understanding between them. Maggie, nevertheless, fancied
that he, young Warlock, was not listening to her. His eyes wandered. He
had that same restlessness of body that she had before noticed in him,
swinging a little on his legs set apart, his hands clasped behind his
thick broad back. He had some compelling interest for her. He had had
that, she now realised, since the first moment that she had seen him.
It might be that the things that that girl had told her about him
increased her interest and, perhaps her sympathy? But it was his
strange detached air of observation that held her--as though he were a
being from some other planet watching them all, liking them, but
bearing no kind of relation to them except that of a cheerful
observer--it was this that attracted her. She liked his thick, rough
untidy hair, the healthy red brown of his cheeks, his light blue eyes,
his air of vigour and bodily health.

As she waited she was startled into consciousness by a voice in her
ear. She turned to find the elder Mr. War