“Look here--I’ll tell you what I haven’t told anybody else, and don’t mean to tell anybody else,” said she, affectionately; and she whispered something into his ear. “Oh, Annie!” “Mind you are not to tell any one--ever. I have not even made you promise, you see.” “You needn’t be afraid. Your brother-in-law is a gentleman,” said William, gravely. The express by which she was going stopped twenty minutes at Beckham; but now the guard was crying, “Take your seats!”--and William had to jump out. He got up on the step outside to see as much as he could of her at the very last, and said, in an important whisper: “But I sha’n’t know where to write to you.” “I will let you know. And mind, William, you are not to drink--at least, not like the others!” “All right; I won’t. I may smoke, mayn’t I?” “Oh, yes, you may smoke, and you may ride and fish and shoot as much as you like; only do try to read a little, and don’t swear quite so much as Wilfred or Harry.” “All right. You don’t mind my saying a big, big D---- when I get a bad fall just before the finish?” “N--o, I’ll pass that. Now get down; the train is going, and you will be hurt.” William jumped off, but dashed down the platform beside the moving train a minute after, panting out, as he threw his purse into the carriage: “You must take it; I’ve taken out all I want, and you may want it. You know I took first-class when you said second. Write.” The last impression she carried away of her life at the Grange was the memory of the big, handsome boy standing looking at the disappearing train, with an expression on his face which threatened tears when he should be out of sight of the busy crowd around him. When Annie’s own tears had stopped, she picked up the boy’s purse, which had fallen as he flung it, on to the opposite seat. It was a handsome purse and pocket-book, given him by his mother; but it had suffered from experiments made upon it with the various articles in his tool-chest. He had begun a diary in it when it was new, which had dwindled down to an occasional note of his transactions in rabbits. There were other boyish documents, a cutting from the _Field_, _et cetera_, and there was more than five pounds in money, a broken scarf-pin, and two used foreign postage-stamps. She had no scruples about accepting the money, which was a welcome addition to her not very large store, and the pocket-book she put in her desk later as a cherished _souvenir_ of the being she cared most about in the world. The boy’s high spirits and frank pleasure in hers had won her from the first, and the only things she regretted in her life at the Grange were the walks and drives and barbaric sports of ratting and mouse-bunting with him as a companion.