"That I haven't, sir, for to go to bed they wouldn't! I've seen a good many children, but never did I see children so set upon their own way as them children!" declared Mrs. Jessop, emphatically. The Doctor felt that this was correct; his opinion being that any children in the least degree resembling Laura's luckily did not exist anywhere. "Oh, spoilt, Mrs. Jessop," he remarked, judicially--"spoilt--that's it! They'll be better, you'll find, when we get a good strict governess for them; and that reminds me, I must certainly advertise for one to-morrow. I don't know how it is that it has slipped my memory for so long. So they're not in bed, the young rogues--eh?" "No, sir--they're with Miss Boucheafen." "With her? You should not have allowed it--you should not have let them go in?" said the Doctor, quickly and peremptorily. "I couldn't help it, sir," returned the housekeeper, stolidly. "They started making such a racket of stamping and screaming outside her door that she heard and opened it to ask what was the matter. Of course, they were for rushing in before I could keep them back, and so she said, Let them stay awhile, and she would keep them still; and so there they are, and she telling them some fairy-tale nonsense." "Well, well!" exclaimed the Doctor; and then added, "How does Miss Boucheafen seem to-day?" "Better, I think, sir--she seems so. She asked me to say that if you were at liberty she would be glad if you could spare her a few minutes." "Tell her I will come up presently," said Doctor Brudenell, going on to the study. "Don't let those young torments stay there long enough to tire her, Mrs. Jessop, if you please. She is still very weak." But, when he went up-stairs half an hour later, he found that Mrs. Jessop had not yet succeeded in getting the "young torments" out of Miss Boucheafen's room. Miss Boucheafen was sitting in a great chair by the fire, her dark hair streaming over her shoulders, and with the children grouped about her--Floss on her knee, Maggie perched on the arm of her chair, and Tom kneeling at her feet, all three listening intently to what she was telling them. What it was the Doctor did not hear, for the group broke up at his entrance; Tom sprang to his feet, Maggie jumped down, and Miss Boucheafen let Floss slip from her knees to the floor. "Oh, uncle, I wish you hadn't come!" cried Tom. "It was such a yuvly 'tory!" lamented Maggie, whose five-year-old vocabulary was but limited; while Floss, whose name was short for Ferdinand, and who had perhaps not yet fully recovered from the shock of his tumble down the kitchen stairs, contented himself with surveying his relative with an implacable expression as he sucked his thumb. "I will finish the story to-morrow, perhaps," said Miss Boucheafen, quietly; "go to bed now. See--Mrs. Jessop is waiting for you."