edgings of
hardy annuals, and here and there a mass of sweet peas filled the air
with a delicious fragrance, while in a corner stood a row of bee-hives,
the buzzing occupants of which seemed busily at work among the scarlet
runners. Isobel thought no enchanted palace could rival the greenhouses,
gay with geraniums and fuchsias and rare plants, the names of which she
did not know, or the vinery with its countless bunches of black grapes
hanging from the roof. It was so particularly nice to be taken round by
the owner, who could pluck the flowers and fruit as he wished, and so
different from the park at home, which was her usual playground, where
you might not walk on the grass, and hardly dared to admire the flowers,
for fear the policeman should suspect you of wanting to touch them.

"You will be quite tired now, and hungry too, I expect," said her host,
as he led the way on to a long glass-roofed veranda in front of the
house, where two chairs and a round table spread for tea were awaiting
them. "I must show you my horses and dogs afterwards. I have five little
collie pups, which I am sure you will like to see, and a brown foal,
only a fortnight old. My coachman has some fan-tail pigeons, too, and a
hutch of rabbits."

It seemed very strange to Isobel to find herself sitting in the
comfortable basket-chair, talking to the colonel while he poured the tea
from the silver teapot into the pretty painted cups. She could scarcely
believe that only three weeks ago she had trespassed in his grounds, and
had almost expected him to send her to prison for the offence, while now
she was chatting to him as freely as if she had known him all her life.
That her holland frock was not improved by an afternoon's play on the
island, that her sand shoes were the worse for wear and her sailor hat
was her oldest, and that the wind had blown her long hair into elf
locks, did not distress her in the least, though I fear Mrs. Stewart
would hardly have considered her in visiting order. Certainly the
colonel did not seem to mind, and whatever he may have thought of the
appearance of his young guest, her good manners and refined accent had
shown him from the first that she was the child of cultured people.

"Mother means to sketch the runic cross on Monday," volunteered Isobel,
as the talk turned on the subject of the island. "She went to Ferndale
to-day on purpose to buy a new block; her old one was too small, and not
the right shape."

"I