deeply.

Actually at the gate she lifted her eyes and looked, with a quivering
sigh at "Tenby," blinking shadeless in the afternoon sun.

The thing was impossible, of course. Not for anything in the world could
she march up to that dread door and calmly propose to interview its
almost sacred tenant.

Yet what a chance it was--in very truth the chance of all her lifetime!
To have a story in print and paid for, she had craved this during all
the long years that separate fourteen from thirty-six.

Again she walked towards the house, again back, this time along a
higher path, to look yet again across the front hedge to the fateful
cottage opposite.

And this time the higher position disclosed a view of the cottage not
obtainable from the big gate. And this view included a little side
verandah. And the little side verandah included Miss Kinross, her ample
proportions disposed upon a small rocking-chair,--Miss Kinross amiably
engaged in eating bananas, and reading a penny woman's paper in the hope
of finding therein some new dish with which to tempt Hugh's appetite.

How very ordinary she looked, how very good-natured and stout!

Sudden and brilliant ideas came more seldom to Miss Bibby than to the
children she was "care-taking." But undoubtedly one seized her now. The
author himself was plainly either out, pacing a mountain top as he
worked out his ideas, or else shut up securely in his study.

What if one threw oneself on the mercy of the stout, kindly-faced lady
over there and implored her aid in the delicate task!

Miss Bibby did what she had probably never done since she was
twenty--acted upon a sudden impulse instead of weighing and considering
her action for days and weeks. She found herself moving across the road,
lifting the latch of "Tenby's" gate, walking, not to the front door and
ringing the bell in a respectable fashion, but forcing her trembling
knees to carry her directly round to the side verandah.

Miss Kinross looked annoyed; few of us like to be caught by a stranger
when we are tilted well back in a rocking-chair eating bananas in our
fingers instead of upon a fruit plate and with orthodox knife and fork.

"Oh," said Miss Bibby, "pray don't be vexed; pray forgive me, it must
seem unpardonably rude, but I--I----" She put her hand to her throat a
moment, too agitated to continue.

Miss Kinross laid down her banana skin and rose to her feet, rapidly
disarmed.

"It is Miss Bibby, is it not?" sh