crubbing at her poor eyes with all her might, with a rather grimy
little ball which she called her "pocket-hankerwich," could she succeed
in destroying all traces of the storm. She ran over to the window and
stood with her back to the door, staring, or pretending to stare, down
at the pretty garden beds, gay with crocuses and snowdrops. But mother's
eyes were not to be so easily deceived. One glance at the peaceful,
though subdued group round the fireplace, one anxious look at the little
figure standing solitary by the window, its fat dimpled shoulders
convulsively heaving every moment or two, its face resolutely turned
away, and mother knew all.

"What is wrong with Miss Julian?" she asked.

"Really, ma'am, I can't quite say. I was down-stairs and when I came
back she was in one of her ways, and you know, ma'am, it is no use
speaking to her while she's like that. It was just some trifle about
Prince, but if it wasn't that it would be something else."

Martin's tone was slightly querulous, but Mrs. Caryll could not resent
it. Martin as a rule was so good and patient with the children, and with
the other three--Maudie and the boys--there was never a shadow of
trouble. Even to Hoodie she was really kind, and though sometimes it did
seem as if she did not take what is called "quite the right way with
her," it would hardly have been fair to blame her for that, seeing that
this mysterious right way in Hoodie's case, was quite as great a puzzle
as the passage round the North Pole! So great a puzzle indeed that its
very existence had come to be doubted, for hitherto one thing only about
it was certain--no one had ever succeeded in finding it.

On the whole, mother herself managed Hoodie better than any one else,
but that, I fear, is not saying much. For whenever, after a long talk
and many tears, Mrs. Caryll left the nursery with a somewhat lightened
heart, thinking that for some time to come at least there was going to
be peace, she was almost _sure_ to be disappointed. Generally these very
times were followed by the worst outbreaks, and in despair Mrs. Caryll
would leave off talks and gentle measures and simply lock the
aggravating little girl into her bedroom, whence in a few hours, the fit
having at last worked itself off, Hoodie would emerge, silent indeed,
but _so_ cross, so unbearably irritable, that no one in the nursery
dared look at her, much less speak to her, till a night's rest had to
some extent soothed her do