haracterised her movements was the first thing which
attracted an unaccustomed eye. Even Clemence, with perceptions dulled
by custom, felt dimly that it was an agreeable thing to watch Darsie
brush her hair and shake out her skirts, though in another person such
acts would be prosaic and tiresome. The crisp hair needed nothing but a
brush and a pat to settle itself into a becoming halo of waves, and the
small face on the long white neck had a quaint, kitten-like charm.
Clemence looked from the real Darsie to the reflected Darsie in the
glass, and felt a sudden knife-like pang.

"Oh, how I _hate_ you going! How dull it will be. Why _couldn't_ you
be content to stay at home instead of taking up this Newnham craze? I
shall miss you hideously, Darsie!"

Darsie smiled involuntarily, then nobly tried to look sad.

"I expect you will, but one grown-up at home is as much as we can
afford, and there'll be lovely long vacs. You must think of those, and
the letters, and coming up to see me sometimes, and term time will pass
in a flash. I'll be back before you realise that I'm gone."

Clemence pouted in sulky denial.

"Nothing of the sort. It will seem an age. It's easy to talk! People
who go away have all the fun and excitement and novelty; it's the poor
stay-at-homes who are to be pitied. How would you like to be me,
sitting down to-morrow morning to darn the socks?"

"Poor old Clem!" said Darsie lightly. A moment later, with relenting
candour, she added: "You'll like it a lot better than being examined by
a Cambridge coach! So don't grouse, my dear; we've both got the work we
like best--come down to lunch, and let's see what mother has provided
for my go-away meal!"

Darsie slid a hand through Clemence's arm as she spoke and the two
sisters squeezed down the narrow staircase, glad in their English,
undemonstrative fashion of the close contact which an inherent shyness
would have forbidden except in this accidental fashion. Across the oil-
clothed passage they went, into the red-walled dining-room, where the
other members of the family waited their arrival.

Mrs Garnett smiled at the traveller with a tinge of wistfulness on her
face; the four young people stared, with a curiosity oddly infused with
respect. A girl who was on the eve of starting for college had soared
high above the level of ordinary school. Lavender, at "nearly
seventeen," wore her fair locks tied back with a broad black ribbon; her
skirt