tten to me all these years.'

At once I was full of interest, not unmixed--and I think it was
natural--with some indignation.

'So he is alive and well, I suppose?' I said, rather bitterly. 'Well,
granny, I hope you will not trouble about him any more. He must be a
horrid man, after all your kindness to him when he was a boy, never to
have written or seemed to care if you were alive or dead.'

'No, dear,' said grandmamma, whose colour was returning, though her
voice still sounded weak and tremulous--'no, dear. You must not think of
him in that way. Careless he has certainly been, but he has not lost his
affection for me. I will explain it all to you soon, but I must think it
over first. I feel still so upset, I can scarcely take it in.'

She stopped, and her breath seemed to come in gasps. I was not a stupid
child, and I had plenty of common sense.

'Granny, dear,' I said, 'don't try to talk any more just now. I will
call Kezia, and she must give you some water, or tea, or something. And
I won't call Mr. Vandeleur horrid if it vexes you.'

Kezia knew how to take care of grandmamma, though it was very, very
seldom she was ever faint or nervous or anything of that kind.

And something told me that the best _I_ could do was to leave dear
granny alone for a little with the faithful servant who had shared her
joys and sorrows for so long.

So I took my own letter--Sharley's letter I mean, and ran upstairs to
fetch my hat and jacket.

'I'm going out for a little, grandmamma,' I said, putting my head in
again for half a second at the drawing-room door as I passed. 'It isn't
cold this morning, and I've got a long letter from Sharley to read over
and over again.'

'Take care of yourself, darling,' said granny, and as I shut the door I
heard her say to Kezia, 'dear child--she has such tact and
thoughtfulness for her age. It is for her I am so thankful, Kezia.'

I was pleased to be praised. I have always loved praise--too much, I am
afraid. But my conscience told me I had _not_ been thoughtful for
grandmamma lately, not as thoughtful as I might have been certainly.
This feeling troubled me on one side, and on the other I was dying with
curiosity to know what it was granny was thankful about. The mere fact
of a letter having come from that 'horrid, selfish, ungrateful man,' as
I still called him to myself, though I would not speak of him so to
grandmamma, could not be anything to be so thankful about--at least not
to b