So Angel and Gerald were left, in a way, to their own devices. It was great fun at first to be the only two at the table at meal times, and both children enjoyed the novelty of the situation; but when, after Mr. Bailey and Mr. Willis had been away several days, the latter wrote to say that they did not intend to return till the beginning of another week, Angel was very disappointed, and Gerald rather cross. "Never mind, I expect they are having an enjoyable time!" she exclaimed. "I do hope they will go and see Mrs. Steer!" "It's so dull without them," her brother grumbled, "and I think Mrs. Vallance is a great deal stricter than she has any right to be. She takes too much upon herself. The idea of her scolding me yesterday because I happened to get caught in a shower!" "But she had told you to take your waterproof to school with you as the weather was so uncertain, and you wouldn't," Angel reminded him; "you ought to have obeyed her, you know. You came home drenched to the skin, and she had the trouble of drying all your clothes." "She's only a servant! She has no right to dictate to us!" "Oh yes, she has! Father said we were to do all we could to please her." Gerald argued no further, for he well knew Angel never yielded a point which she considered right. The children were in the dining-room, where they were just finishing their lessons. Work ended, they put away their books and strolled out of doors, making their way to the kitchen garden, where Mrs. Vallance and Polly were busily occupied in picking raspberries for preserving. Angel at once volunteered her help, which was gladly accepted; and Gerald, after refreshing himself with a goodly quantity of the luscious fruit, wandered aimlessly towards the house, and finally went by the back door into the kitchen. The kitchen at Haresdown House, the window of which commanded an uninterrupted view of the whole of the back garden, was a very pleasant room, and the picture of neatness. Gerald's roving eyes wandered from the gay prints which decorated the walls to the shining tin and copper articles on the mantel-piece, and from thence to an open workbox and a desk on a side table. The desk was locked, but the key had been left in the lock. Gerald wondered what was inside; and impelled by curiosity, and never reflecting that his action was dishonourable, he unlocked the desk, opened it, and examined its contents—a few sheets of notepaper, a parcel of envelopes, pens, and a dainty little tortoise-shell box, which he lifted with careful fingers. "I expect this was a present," he thought; "how pretty it is! I wonder if it belongs to Mrs. Vallance or Polly—to Mrs. Vallance, I suppose." He opened it, and to his astonishment saw it contained several pieces of gold and a crisp five-pound note.