endyce's mouth had dropped open from sheer amazement;
suddenly it broadened into a grin. Here was Miss Gordon taking her
"head" at once, without so much as one lesson. He glanced at Percival
Tubbs but that good gentleman was stroking his silky beard quite
indifferently.

"I'd rather have Beryl than anyone else, 'cause she's almost my own age
and we like each other. Shall I tell Mrs. Budge or--"

"Without so much as a by-your-leave!" murmured the guardian. He surveyed
Beryl; she seemed like a wholesome, spirited sort and the idea of a
little companion for Miss Gordon was not a bad one, not at all--strange
he hadn't thought of it.

"Perhaps, Miss Gordon, you'd better tell her yourself. You must
begin--holding your own, my dear. Don't forget--ever, that you are a
Forsyth, and that name has great power over Hannah Budge."

Robin did not stop to ponder what he meant or why a twinkle shone in his
eyes. She rang the bell as her guardian indicated, then waited with a
resolute squaring of her small chin, for Harkness' coming.

"Please, Mr. Harkness, will you bring Mrs. Budge here? There's something
I want to tell you both."

Mrs. Budge, as she hunted out a clean apron, grumbled at the unusual
summons.

"The girl herself, you say?" she asked, as she followed Harkness to the
library.

Her astonishment changed to white wrath when Robin, standing by her
guardian's chair, spoke.

"I wanted to tell you that Beryl Lynch is going to stay here as my
companion. I'm going to give her half of my room so that I won't be
lonely and please set a place for her next to me at the table."

Once again Cornelius Allendyce caught the twinkle in the butler's eye
which should not be in a Forsyth butler's eye at all. But there was no
twinkle about Mrs. Budge; her cheeks puffed in her effort to speak
without strangling.

"If that piece--" she began, but she was quickly interrupted from every
side. Both Harkness and Cornelius Allendyce cried out, the one
pleadingly, the other in warning: "Careful, Mrs. Budge." Then Robin
stepped forward and slipped her hand through Beryl's arm.

"Please, Mrs. Budge, I have made Beryl promise to stay. She didn't want
to but I begged her. And if anyone is unkind to her it's just the same
as being--unkind to me. That is all," she finished grandly, with an
imperious little motion of her hand that waved the irate woman from the
room before she knew she was moving.

"Now you can't say as that wasn't like a Fors