ct
honestly and openly by all the world, and yet fate
has entangled me in such a series of nets and
toils and entanglements, that I dare not speak a
word for fear of consequences, not to myself but to
others.'"

Sweetheart sighed again and repeated thoughtfully,
"I _am_ sorry for Die Vernon!"

"Humph," said Hugh John, with dogged masculine
logic, "girls are always making up troubles, I
think. I don't see what she has to 'whimp'
about--everybody did just as she said at that
Hall--more than I would do for any silly girl, I
bet! Just you try it on, only once, Miss
Sweetheart, that's all! She has all she can eat and
can order it herself--lots of horses and riding--a
gun--cricky, I only wish I had her chances! Think
of it--just oblige me by thinking of it--secret
passages to come and go by, night and day, right
plumb in the wall under your nose, mysterious
priests, Jesuits, Jacobites, and things. Why, it's
nearly as good as Crusoe's Island, I declare."

Sweetheart looked at Hugh John with the far-away
gentle compassion which always drove that
matter-of-fact warrior wild.

"All girls are the same," he asserted insultingly,
"they always get thinking they are going to die
right off, if only their little finger aches!"

"You'll be sorry!" said Sweetheart, warningly.

"Oh, will I?" said Hugh John, truculently, "isn't
what I say true, Toady Lion?"

But Toady Lion was sitting upon a buffet, in the
character of Morris upon his portmanteau. He was
shaking and chattering with such exaggerated terror
that Maid Margaret, wrapped in a dust-sheet for a
disguise and armed with the kitchen poker, could
not rob him for very laughter. So neither of them
paid any heed.

"You'll be sorry for speaking like that about Die
Vernon," Sweetheart went on; "I've looked and I
know. She was a true heroine. And she is worth a
whole pack of your heroes any day."

"And, indeed, that's not saying much!" said Hugh
John, who also had his sorrows. "But at any rate
that was no proper place to break off a story. And
I'll tell father so. Let's tease to have some more.
It's a wet day, and we can't do anything else!"

"Oh, yes--let's!" said Sweetheart. "Stop all that,
Toady Lion, and you, Maid Margaret. We are going to
ask for the second tale from _Rob