ing dusk and turned their faces homeward.
But they had not gone twenty yards from the spot where Cleek had seen
them last when the little boy set up a joyful cry and pointed excitedly
to a claret-coloured limousine which at that moment swung in from the
middle of the roadway and slowed down as it neared the kerb.

"Oh, look, Miss Lorne; here's mummie's motor-car; and I do believe
that's Bimbi peeping out of it!" exclaimed the child--"Bimbi" being his
pet name for Captain Hawksley--then broke, in wild excitement, from
Ailsa's detaining hand and fled to a tall, military-looking man with a
fair beard and moustache who had just that moment alighted from the
vehicle. "It is Bimbi--it is!--it is!" he shouted as he ran. "Oh, Bimbi,
I _am_ glad!"

"Ceddie, dear, you mustn't be so boisterous!" chided Ailsa, coming up
with him at the kerb. "How fond he is of you to be sure, Captain
Hawksley. You've come for us, I suppose? Ceddie recognized the car at
once."

"Yes; jump in," he answered. "Lady Chepstow sent me after you. She's
nervous, poor soul, every moment the boy's away from her. Jump in, old
chap! Better take the back seat, Miss Lorne; it's more comfortable.
Quite settled, both of you? That's good. All right, chauffeur--Home!"

Then he jumped in after them, closed the door, dropped into a seat, and
the motor, making a wide curve out into the road, pelted away into the
fast-gathering darkness.

"Bimbi says maybe he's going to be my daddy one day--didn't you, Bimbi?"
said his little lordship, climbing up on to "Bimbi's" knee and snuggling
close to him.

"I say, you know, you mustn't tell secrets, old chap!" was the laughing
response. "Miss Lorne will hand you over to Nursie with orders to put
you to bed if you do, I know. Won't you, Miss Lorne?"

"He ought to be in bed, anyhow," responded Ailsa gaily; and then, this
giving the conversation a merry turn, they talked and laughed and kept
up such a chatter that three-quarters of an hour went like magic and
nobody seemed aware of it. But suddenly Ailsa thought, and then put her
thoughts into words.

"What a long time we are in getting home," she said, and bent forward so
that the light from the window might fall upon the dial of her wrist
watch, then gave a little startled cry and half rose from her seat. For
the darkness was now tempered by moonlight and she could see that they
were no longer in the populous districts of the town, but were speeding
along past woodlands a