. He had come into the nursery where the three little girls were
playing--Halcyone and her two stepsisters--and he had made them all
stand up in his rough way, and see who could catch the pennies the best
that he threw from the door. His brother, "Uncle Ted," was with him. And
the two younger children, Mabel of five and Ethel of four, shouted
riotously with glee and snatched the coins from one another and greedily
quarreled over those which Halcyone caught with her superior skill and
handed to them.

She remembered her stepfather's face--it grew heavy and sullen and he
walked to the window, where his brother followed him--and she remembered
their words and had pondered over them often since.

"It's the damned breeding in the brat that fairly gets me raw, Ted," Mr.
Anderton had said. "Why the devil couldn't Elaine have given it to my
children, too. I can't stand it--a home must be found for her
elsewhere."

And soon after that, Halcyone had come with her own Priscilla to La
Sarthe Chase to her great-aunts Ginevra and Roberta, in their
tumble-down mansion which her father had not lived to inherit. Under
family arrangements, it was the two old ladies' property for their
lives.

And now the problem of what James Anderton--or rather the second Mrs.
James Anderton--would do was the question of the moment. Would there be
a fresh governess or would they all be left in peace without one? Mrs.
James Anderton, Miss Roberta had said once, was a person who "did her
duty," as people often did "in her class"--"a most worthy woman, if not
quite a lady"--and she had striven to do her best by James Anderton's
children--even his stepchild Halcyone.

Miss La Sarthe promised to write that night before she went to bed--but
Halcyone knew it was a long process with her and that an answer could
not be expected for at least a week. Therefore there was no good
agitating herself too soon about the result. It was one of her
principles never to worry over unnecessary things. Life was full of
blessed certainties to enjoy without spoiling them by speculating over
possible unpleasantnesses.

The old gentleman--Cheiron--and old William and the timid curate who
came to dine on Saturday nights once a month were about the only male
creatures Halcyone had ever spoken to within her recollection--their
rector was a confirmed invalid and lived abroad--but Priscilla had a
supreme contempt for them as a sex.

"One and all set on themselves, my lamb," sh