"What a bother it is about money!" the boy exclaimed. "How I wish we were rich! I was going to ask father if he could let me have a shilling—I haven't a farthing of my last week's allowance left—do you think he'll let me have it?" "He will if he can," Angel replied seriously, "but I'm afraid he is rather hard up at present. When his picture is finished—" "Oh, what is the good of talking of that!" Gerald interrupted impatiently. "The picture may not sell for much, after all! I wish father was not an artist." "Gerald!" the little girl exclaimed reproachfully, "how can you speak so? Mother used to say God had given father his wonderful talent for painting, and he must use it. Father is a genius. He will paint a beautiful picture which will be hung in the Royal Academy for every one to look at, and then some rich man will want to buy it, and offer father hundreds of pounds if he will sell it to him." Angel was allowing her imagination to run away with her, and in her excitement momentarily forgot the work in hand, so that she burnt a corner of the slice of bread she was toasting. This sobered her somewhat, and she continued more quietly— "Then we shall pay all our bills, and live in a nicer place than this, and father will send me to school; and—oh, Gerald, it seems too wonderful to ever happen, doesn't it? Think what it would feel like to have money to pay for everything, and never to be in debt! How happy we should be!" Her brother made no reply. His blue eyes were fixed thoughtfully on the glowing embers in the grate. "Here comes father," he whispered presently; "will you ask him some time this evening if he can spare me a shilling? You will, won't you?" And Angel promised she would, though she shrank sensitively from doing so, knowing how short Mr. Willis was of ready money; but it would have seemed unkind to refuse her brother's coaxing request. CHAPTER II An Unexpected Visitor ANGEL'S life was a very monotonous one. She spent most of her days alone whilst her brother was at school, and her father was occupied in his studio. Sometimes one of her father's artist friends would pause at the door of the sitting-room to inquire if Mr. Willis was at home; but no one ever stayed to exchange more than a few sentences with her, and she spent her time in reading, or dreaming, or looking out of the window on the miles of roofs stretching before her eyes when there was no mending for her father or brother to be done. Occasionally Mrs. Steer took pity on the lonely child, and asked her to accompany her when she went out to do her shopping; and, on Saturday afternoons she now and then had a stroll with her brother; but Gerald usually spent his half-holidays with his school-friends, so that he had not much time to devote to his sister.