ns ran through my head as I lay trying not to go to
sleep, and yet feeling sleep coming steadily on me in spite of my
troubles.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER VIII.

WANTED A STAMP.

"I am so old, so old, I can write a letter."

I had meant, you will remember, to write my letter to Pierson late at
night when everybody was in bed. I had been afraid of writing it till I
was sure everybody was asleep, for if the light in the nursery had been
seen, there was no saying what Mrs. Partridge might not have done, she
would have been so angry. So I settled in my own mind to get up in the
middle of the night--quite in the middle--to write it. But nobody--no
big person at least--will be surprised to hear that for all my plans and
resolutions I never woke! The beginning and the middle of the night
passed, and the end came, and it was not till the faint winter dawn was
trying to make its way through the smoky London air that I woke up, to
find it was morning--for a few minutes later I heard the stair clock
strike seven.

At first I was dreadfully vexed with myself, then I began to think
perhaps it was better. Even in the very middle of the night I might have
been seen, and, after all, the letter would not have gone any sooner for
having been written in the night instead of in the day-time. And in the
day-time it was easy for me to write without minding any one seeing me,
for Tom and I had our lessons to do for our tutor for the next day.

As soon as he had gone, therefore, I got my paper and set to work. I am
not going to tell you just yet what I wrote to Pierson. You will know
afterwards. You see I want to make my story as like a proper one as I
can, _in case_ aun---- oh, there I am again, like a goose, going to
spoil it all! I meant to say, that I have noticed that in what I call
proper stories, real book, printed ones, though it all seems to come
quite smooth and straight, it is really arranged quite plannedly--you
are told just a bit, and then you are quietly taken away to another bit,
and though you never think of it at the time, you find it all out
afterwards. Well, I wrote my letter to Pierson after Tom and I had
finished our lessons for our tutor. I told Tom I had written it, and
then--the next thing was how to get it stamped and taken to the post.

"I wish I had thought of buying a stamp when we were out this morning,"
I said. I have forgotten to tell you that in the morning, early, we had
b