ancy when, the visit
nearly over, she and Pennie were putting on their hats again, "and
you'll ask Kettles to see us next time we come, won't you?"

But this Nurse would not promise. It was hard, she said, to refuse any
of the dear children anything, and she was aware how little she had to
give them, but she knew her duty to herself and Mrs Hawthorne. Kettles
must not be asked. "To think," she concluded, "of you two young ladies
sitting down to table with people out of Anchor and Hope Alley!"

"We always have tea with the children at the school feasts at home,"
said Nancy.

"That's quite different, my dear, in your dear papa's own parish," said
Nurse.

"Are they wicked people in Anchor and Hope Alley?" asked Pennie. "Is
Kettles wicked?"

"Poor little soul, no, I wouldn't say that," said Nurse. "She's a great
help to her mother and does her best. But she sees things and hears
things that you oughtn't to know anything about, and so she's not fit
company for such as you. And now it's time to go to the gate."

As they passed Anchor and Hope Alley on their way to Miss Unity's house
in the Close Pennie stretched her neck to see as far down it as she
could.

"How dark and narrow it is! Fancy living there!" she said. "Don't you
wonder which is Kettles' house?"

"Shouldn't you like to know," said Nancy, "what it was that her father
did when he came home that night? I do so wish Nurse hadn't stopped
her."

"What a nice little funny face she had!" said Pennie thoughtfully, "such
bright eyes! If it was washed clean, and her hair brushed back smooth,
and she had white stockings and a print frock, how do you suppose she'd
look?"

"Not half so nice," said Nancy at once, "all neat and proper, just like
one of the school-children at Easney."

And indeed it was her look of wildness that made Kettles attractive to
Pennie and Nancy, used to the trim propriety of well-cared-for village
children, who curtsied when you spoke to them, and always said "Miss."
There was a freedom in the glance of Kettles' eye and a perfect
carelessness of good manners in her bearing which was as interesting as
it was new.

"She's the sort of little girl who lives in a caravan and sells brushes
and brooms," continued Pennie as the carriage stopped at Miss Unity's
door.

Mrs Hawthorne was accustomed sometimes to read to herself during her
frequent drives between Easney and Nearminster, and to-day, when the
children saw that she had he