dyship arrived, and Benjamin the coachboy came up the garden pathway
as her harbinger to see if she should descend from the carriage to
interview the old lady. She did not want to do so, as she felt she ought
to get Mrs. Prichard home as soon as possible; but wanted, all the same,
to fulfil her promise of delivering Sister Nora's parcel with her own
hands. She was glad to remain in the carriage, on hearing from Benjamin
that both Granny Marrable and her daughter were on the spot; and would,
said he, be out in a minute.

"They'll curtsey," said Gwen. "Do, dear Mrs. Picture, keep awake one
minute more. I want you so much to see Dave's other Granny. She's such a
nice old body!" Can any student of language say why these two old women
should be respectively classed as an old soul and an old body, and why
the cap should fit in either case?

"I won't go to sleep," said Mrs. Prichard, making a great effort. "That
must be Dave's duck-pond, across the road." The duck-pond had no alloy.
She did not feel that her curiosity about Dave's other Granny was quite
without discomfort.

"Oh--had Dave a duck-pond? It looks very black and juicy.... Here come
the two Goodies! I've brought you a present from Sister Nora, Granny
Marrable. It's in here. I know what it is because I've seen it--it's
nice and warm for the winter. Take it in and look at it inside. I
mustn't stop because of Mrs.... There now!--I was quite forgetting...."
It shows how slightly Gwen was thinking of the whole transaction that
she should all but tell Blencorn to drive home at this point, with the
scantiest farewell to the Goodies, who had curtsied duly as foretold.
She collected herself, and continued:--"You remember the small boy, Mrs.
Marrable, when I came with Sister Nora, whose letter we read about the
thieves and the policeman?"

"Ah, dear, indeed I do! That dear child!--why, what would we not give,
Ruth and me, to see him again?"

"Well, this is Mrs. Picture, who wrote his letter for him. This is
Granny Marrable, that Dave told you all about. She says she wants him
back."

And then Maisie and Phoebe looked each other in the face again after
half a century of separation. Surely, if there is any truth in the
belief that the souls of twins are linked by some unseen thread of
sympathy, each should have been stirred by the presence of the other. If
either was, she had no clue to the cause of her perturbation. They
looked each other in the face; and each made some