s very important."

Then he walked away down the drive.

Meantime Marjorie and Dona had been waiting in momentary expectation of
a call to the drawing-room. They could hardly believe the bad news when
scouts informed them that their brother had left without seeing them.

"Gone away!" echoed Dona, almost in tears.

"But why? Who sent him away?" demanded Marjorie indignantly.

At this crisis Mena Matthews hurried in with the note. Dona read it,
with Marjorie looking over her shoulder. It ran:

"DEAR OLD BUNTING,

"Your schoolmistress guards you like nuns, but I must see you
and Squibs somehow. Can you manage to peep over the wall,
right-hand side of gate? I'll walk up and down the road for half
an hour, on the chance. Yours,

"LARRY."

There was a hockey match that afternoon between the second and third
teams, and all the school was making its way in the direction of the
playing-fields. Within the next minute, however, Marjorie and Dona, with
a select escort of friends to act as scouts, had reached the garden
wall, and were climbing up with an agility that would have delighted
their gymnasium mistress, could she have witnessed the performance.
Larry, in the road below, grinned as the two familiar heads appeared
above the coping.

"It isn't safe to talk here," called Marjorie. "Go down that side lane
till you come to some wooden palings. We'll cut across the plantation,
and meet you there."

"All serene!" laughed Larry, hugely enjoying the joke.

The school grounds were large, covering many acres, and a private road
led down the side towards the kitchen garden. Larry found his sisters
already ensconced on the palings, looking out for him.

"I say, this is rather the limit, isn't it?" he greeted them. "The Mater
wrote and said I might take you to Whitecliffe, and that icicle in the
drawing-room wouldn't even so much as let me have a glimpse of you. Is
this place you've got to a convent? Are you both required to take the
veil, please?"

"Not just yet. But what happened?" asked Marjorie. "Mena says the
Empress is out this afternoon. Whom did you see?"

"A grim, fair-haired Gorgon in glasses, who withered me with a look."

"The Acid Drop, surely."

"Probably. She certainly wasn't sweet."

"And she wouldn't let us go?" wailed Dona.

"No, poor old Baby Bunting. It's a rotten business, isn't it? No dragon
in a fairy tale could have guarded the princess more closely. If I'd
stayed a