es, which filled and overflowed like a child's, without
painful effort or grimaces. "You--you remind me so of your father,"
she said, almost involuntarily.

"I'm glad I'm like him," said Peter.

She sighed. "How I used to wish you were a little tiny bit like me
too!"

"But I'm not, am I?"

"No, you're not. Not one tiny bit," she answered wistfully. "But you
do love me, Peter?"

"Haven't I proved I love you?" said Peter; and she perceived that
his feelings were hurt. "Coming back, and--and thinking only of you,
and--and of never leaving you any more. Why, mother"--for in an agony
of love and remorse she was clinging to him and sobbing, with her face
pressed against his empty sleeve--"why, mother," Peter repeated, in
softened tones, "of course I love you."

The drawing-room door was cautiously opened, and Peter's aunts came
into the hall on tiptoe, followed by the canon.

"Ah, I thought so," said Lady Belstone, in the self-congratulatory
tones of the successful prophet, "it has been too much for poor Mary.
She has been overcome by the joy of dear Peter's return."

CHAPTER XII

"Try my salts, dear Mary," said Miss Crewys, hastening to apply the
remedies which were always to be found in her black velvet reticule.

"I blame myself," said the canon, distressfully--"I blame myself. I
should have insisted on breaking the news to her gently."

Lady Mary smiled upon them all. "On the contrary," she said, "I was
offering, not a moment ago, to take Peter round and show him the
improvements. We have been so much occupied with each other that he
has not had time to look round him."

"I wish he may think them improvements, my love," said Lady Belstone.

Miss Crewys, joyously scenting battle, hastened to join forces with
her sister.

"We are far from criticizing any changes your dear mother may have
been induced to make," she said; "but as your Aunt Isabella has
frequently observed to me, what _can_ a Londoner know of landscape
gardening?"

"A Londoner?" said Peter.

"Your guardian, my boy," said the canon, nervously. "He has slightly
opened out the views; that is all your good aunt is intending to say."

Peter's good aunt opened her mouth to contradict this assertion
indignantly, but Lady Mary broke in with some impatience.

"I do not mean the trees. Of course the house was shut in far too
closely by the trees at the back and sides. We wanted more air, more
light, more freedom." She drew a long breath a