When at last they reached the Zoo Meg took it upon herself to
remonstrate with her younger charge.

"You mustn't ask strangers for things, dear; you really mustn't--not in
the street or in the train."

"What for?" asked Fay. She nearly always said, "What for" when she meant
"Why"; and it was as hard-worked a phrase as "What nelse?"

"Because people don't do it, you know."

"They do--I've heard 'em."

"Well, beggars perhaps, but not nice little girls."

"Do nasty little girls?"

"_Only_ nasty little girls would do it, I think."

Fay pondered this for a minute, then in a regretfully reflective voice
she said sadly: "Vat was a nasty, gleedy sahib in a tlain."

"Not at all," Meg argued, struggling with her mirth. "How would you have
liked it if he'd asked you to give him your bonnet 'to keep'?"

Little Fay hastily put up her hands to her head to be sure her bonnet
was in its place, then she inquired with great interest: "What's 'is
place, deah Med?"

"Deah Med" soon found herself followed round by a small crowd of other
sight-seers who waited for and greeted little Fay's unceasing comments
with joyful appreciation. Such popular publicity was not at all to Meg's
taste, and although the afternoon was extremely cold her cheeks never
ceased to burn till she got the children safely back to the flat again.
Tony was gloomy and taciturn. Nobody took the slightest notice of him.
Weather that seemed to brace his sister to the most energetic gaiety
only made him feel torpid and miserable. He was not naughty, merely
apathetic, uninterested, and consequently uninteresting. Meg thought he
might be homesick and sad about Ayah, and was very kind and gentle, but
her advances met with no response.

By this time Tony was sure of his aunt, but he had by no means made up
his mind about Meg.

When they got back to Kensington Meg joyously handed over the children
to Jan while she retired to her room to array herself in her uniform.
She was to "take over" from that moment, and approached her new sphere
with high seriousness and an intense desire to be, as she put it, "a
wild success."

For weeks she had been reading the publications of the P. N. E. U. and
the "Child-Study Society," to say nothing of Manuals upon "Infant
Hygiene," "The Montessori Method" and "The Formation of Character."
Sympathy and Insight, Duty and Discipline, Self-Control and Obedience,
Regularity and Concentration of Effort--all with the largest
capitals--w