"
"How stupid you must have been!" said Babie. "That comes of you,
neither of you, ever reading. You couldn't have done it right,
Cecil."
"Do you really think so?" he asked, in such piteous, earnest tones
that he touched her heart.
"Dear Cecil," she said, "it will be all right. I know Essie likes
you better than any one else."
She had almost added "though she is an ungrateful little puss for
doing so," but before the words had time to come out of her mouth,
Cecil had flown at her in a transport, thrown his arms round her and
kissed her, just as her mother opened the door, and uttered an odd
incoherent cry of amazement.
"Oh, Mother Carey," cried Cecil, colouring all over, "I didn't know
what I was doing! She gave me hope!"
"I give you hope too," said Caroline, "though I don't know how it
might have been if she had come down just now!"
"Don't!" entreated Cecil. "Babie is as good as my sister. Why,
where is she?"
"Fled, and no wonder!"
"And won't she, Esther, come?"
"She is far too much frightened and overcome. She says you may go to
her father, and I think that is all you can expect her to say."
"Is it? Won't she see me? I don't want it to be obedience."
"I don't think you need have any fears on that score.
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