servants were all ordered off to the neighbouring
town, and desired to transpose themselves into
mere carriers of baggage (and that not their
master's), and bring back the luggage of the
old gentleman and the young lady.

Now, with having so much to do, I was
wholly forgetful of Robert's feelings on the
matter. Not until dinner was over, and the
young lady had gone up to see if the old
gentleman was still continuing "comfortable," did
I recollect to say, "My goodness me, Robert,
to think of my having done such a thing without
your leave!"

"I do not know what you have done; but
I know that is the prettiest girl I ever saw."

"Now, Robert!"

Robert did not often praise people. If he
did, it was in a round-about way.

"Robert, she is a French girl."

"And why shouldn't a French girl be
pretty?"

"You know she is not pretty." N.B. I
wonder if I was jealous? However, if I was,
that was my first and last twinge. I began to
see directly what Robert meant by her being
so pretty. She had such sweet ways. She
beamed over with goodness, and though she
spoke English wonderfully well—astonishingly
well—she had a way of placing her words that
made everything she said piquante and lovable.
Thus, when I wished her good night, she had so
engaged my heart, that I gave her a kiss.

"Ah!" she said, returning it, "that is a
thing of you so good! I am no more strange,
but a little friend ever to be."

So I was obliged to kiss her again. When
we met in the morning, she offered her cheek
at once, saying:

"Good morrow, dear friend."

Odd to say, the more I found to love in her,
the less did Robert. The fact is, men like to
be flattered. And this extraordinary little
French girl was overflowing in all sorts of
pretty ways to me, and only treated Robert in
a ceremonious and half-disdainful way.

"How could I think her pretty!" said
Robert. "Her nose is the most complete turn-up
I ever saw."

"I think it such a pretty little nose."

"She does not turn it up at you as she does
at me."

"As if she could alter her nose!"

But Robert began to see that she was not
singular in her way to him only. Her dear
little nose turned up at all men. But as for
us, the women, we loved her dearly, and she
loved us. The sweetest, merriest, darling that
ever lived. How we had ever existed without
her, we could not now understand.

"Patty," said Robert to me, "the squire is
in love!"

"My goodness me, Robert, how you startle
me! Who is the lady? Is it the duke's
youngest daughter, or the Lady Amabel?"

"Neither; it is Pet."

"Now, Robert!"

Pet was our name for the sweet girl. Her
real name was Frances Angelique du Chaine.
Her mother was an Englishwoman, daughter to
the old gentleman driven over by the squire's
imperious servants and horses. He called her
Fanny. That was too prosaic a name for us.
We began with Fanny, but soon got to Pet.

"The squire in love with Pet! As if I
should not have seen that before you, Robert!"

"Perhaps you ought to have done so—
perhaps you would have done so, had he not
confided his love to me."

"My dear Robert. Such a splendid match!
And the dear child was going to be a governess."

"Patty, don't lose your senses. He fell in
love the first day, and wanted to propose on the
bridge——"

"Now, Robert!"

"—and every day since; but he does not
know how to do it, she is so reserved and shy
to him."

"My goodness me, Robert, but that must
be altered. If she was only like Sarah Jane,
now!"

"If she was like Sarah Jane, the squire
would not have fallen in love with her."

"Well, no. Dear me; Pet to live here
among us. Oh! my dear Robert, what a
fortunate thing was that accident."

"We don't know yet. Perhaps Pet will not
accept the squire."

A fear seemed to rise in my heart, for indeed
she seemed to have an antipathy to men, such as
some folks have to cats. Only lately had she
begun to find out that Robert had nothing
obnoxious about him.

"Your Robert," she had said to me, "is
good. Oh! so good. He is like a woman."

Perhaps Robert might not have thought this
a compliment, and for fear he should not, I did
not tell him of it.

But at all events, Pet having accorded him
her affection, now gave him such abundant
proofs of it, that he once more thought her the
prettiest girl he had ever seen.

"You must go and break the matter to her,
Patty."

"Oh no, Robert; let the squire tell her
himself."

"But she will not give him the opportunity."

"Tell him to come this evening when we are
sitting in the verandah. I will so place Pet as
that she shall have her back to the bridge, but
I shall be looking on it. Thus I shall see him
coming, and just as I know his hand is on the
wicket of our garden gate, I will make a pretence
to go for something, and he will catch her alone.
Such a splendid match!"

Robert approving of my plan, all was executed
most delightfully:—except that the squire, more
nervous than ever through anxiety, sped up the
hill so quickly, that I had not given myself time
to execute my little manœuvre, and he was so
astonished to see me, that he tumbled over my
work-basket, and, altogether, made an
ignominious rather than a pleasing entry.

However, I made a dash after one of my balls