and
which accepted.

When the dogcart was announced by Annie, with beaming eyes, Dion got
his gun, Robin received his whip,--a miniature hunting-crop with a horn
handle,--his cap was pulled down firmly on his head by Rosamund, and
they set forth to the Green Court. Here they found Harrington's most
fiery horse harnessed to quite a sporting dogcart and doing his very
best to champ his bit. From the ground Robin looked up at him with
solemn eyes. The occasion was almost too great. His father with a gun,
his own legs in gaiters, the whip which he felt in his hand, the packet
of sandwiches thrust tenderly by nurse into the pocket of his little
covert coat, and now this glorious animal and this high and unusual
carriage gleaming with light-colored wood between its immense wheels!
There was almost too much of meaning, too much of suggestion in it all.
No words came to him. He could only feel and gaze.

A stableman with hard lips stood sentinel in front of the fiery horse,
and put up a red forefinger on the right side of his temple to give them
greeting.

"I'll get in first," said Dion to Rosamund, "and then you can hand me up
Robin."

He put in his gun and took the reins, while Robin instinctively extended
his arms so that his mother could take hold of him under them.

"Up we go!" cried Dion.

And he mounted lightly to the high seat.

"Now, Robin!"

Rosamund took hold of Robin, whose short arms were still solemnly
outstretched. She was about to lift him into the cart, but, overcome by
an irresistible impulse, she paused, put one arm under the little legs
in the gaiters, drew him to her and pressed her lips on the freckled
bridge of his tiny nose.

"You darling!" she whispered, so that only he could hear. "I love you in
your gaiters better than I ever loved you before." Then she handed him
up to his father as if he were a dear little parcel.

"That's it," said Dion. "Put your arm round here, boy. Hold on tight!
Let him go!"

The hard-lipped man stood to one side and the horse--well, moved. Robin
gazed down at his mother with the faint hint of an almost shy smile,
Dion saluted her with his whip, and the glorious day was fairly begun.
Traveling with a sort of rakish deliberation the dogcart skirted the
velvet lawn of the Green Court and disappeared from sight beneath the
ancient archway.

Rosamund sighed as she turned to walk back to Little Cloisters. She
had made a real sacrifice that day in giving up Robin to