I "fretted"--as the servants expressed it--to such an extent as to affect my health; and I fancy it was because my father's attention was called to the fact that I was fast fading after the mother and sister whose death (and my own loneliness) I bewailed, that he roused himself from his own grief to comfort mine. Once more I was "dressed" after tea. Of late my bony nurse had not thought it necessary to go through this ceremony, and I had crept about in the same crape-covered frock from breakfast to bedtime. Now I came down to dessert again, and though I think the empty place at the end of the table gave my father a fresh shock when I took my old post by him, yet I fancy the lonely evening was less lonely for my presence. From his intense indulgence I think I dimly gathered that he thought me ill. I combined this in my mind with a speech of my nurse's that I had overheard, and which gave me the horrors at the time--"He's got _the look_! It's his poor ma over again!"--and I felt a sort of melancholy self-importance not uncommon with children who are out of health. I may say here that my nurse had a quality very common amongst uneducated people. She was "sensational;" and her custom of going over all the circumstances of my mother's death and funeral (down to the price of the black paramatta of which her own dress was composed) with her friends, when she took me out walking, had not tended to make me happier or more cheerful. That night I ate more from my father's plate than I had eaten for weeks. As I lay after dinner with my head upon his breast, he stroked my curls with a tender touch that seemed to heal my griefs, and said, almost in a tone of remorse, "What can papa do for you, my poor dear boy?" I looked up quickly into his face. "What would Regie like?" he persisted. I quite understood him now, and spoke out boldly the desires of my heart. "Please, papa, I should like Mrs. Bundle for a nurse; and I do very much want Rubens." "And who is Rubens?" asked my father. "Oh, please, it's a dog," I said. "It belongs to Mr. Mackenzie at the school. And it's such a little dear, all red and white; and it licked my face when nurse and I were there yesterday, and I put my hand in its mouth, and it rolled over on its back, and it's got long ears, and it followed me all the way home, and I gave it a piece of bread, and it can sit up, and"-- "But, my little man," interrupted my father--and he had absolutely smiled at my catalogue of marvels--"if Rubens belongs to Mr. Mackenzie, and is such a wonderful fellow, I'm afraid Mr. Mackenzie won't part with him." "He would," I said, "but--" and I paused, for I feared the barrier was insurmountable. "But what?" said my father. "He wants ten shillings for him, Nurse says." "If that's all, Regie," said my father, "you and I will go and buy Rubens to-morrow morning."