at Roman history--oh, Miss Ross!'

'You have worked hard at that, have you not, Mollie?'

'You would say so if you had heard us,' returned Mollie with a shrug;
'we used to grind away at it until I was quite stupid. Sometimes I
wanted to practise or to go on with my French. But no: mamma had
promised Cyril, and there was no help for it. I have filled one
note-book, but I am not sure I remember half. Mamma reads so fast, and
she is always vexed if I do not understand; but,' with a look of relief,
'I don't think we shall do so much now. Mamma has got her walking mood
again.'

Audrey tried not to smile. 'Next week we shall resume our lessons,
Mollie.'

'Oh, that will be delightful,'--standing still, for they were now
entering the shrubberies of Hillside; 'somehow, no one teaches like you,
Miss Ross: you never seem to grow impatient or to mind telling things
over again; but mother is always in such a hurry, and she is so clever
herself that she has no patience with a dunce like me.'

'My dear Mollie, please do not call yourself names--you are certainly no
dunce.'

'I don't mean to be one any longer,' replied Mollie, brightening up.
'Oh, Miss Ross, what do you think Cyril says! that I am not to help
Biddy any more, and that we are to have a woman in to do the rough work.
I don't think mamma was quite pleased when he talked about it. She said
it was uncalled-for extravagance, and that we really could not afford
it; that a little work did not hurt me, and that I ought to be glad to
make myself useful. Mamma was almost annoyed with Cyril, but he always
knows how to soothe her down. Of course it will be as he wishes, and
mamma has promised to speak to you about a woman; and so I shall have
plenty of time to do my lessons; and it will be my own fault if I am a
dunce now,' finished Mollie, with a close hug, as the thick shrubs
screened them from any prying eyes.

'Poor little soul! I must help her all I can,' thought Audrey, as she
walked on to the house. 'I am glad her brother takes her part;' and then
her brother-in-law met her in the porch and took her into the
morning-room, where the two ladies were sitting, and where Geraldine
welcomed her as though months, and not hours, had separated them.

Audrey's first visit had always been paid to the O'Briens; so the
following afternoon she started off for Brail as a matter of course.

'Perhaps you will come and have tea with mother, Gage,' she had said on
bidding her sister