'Hush, hush, hush!' He took her hand into both of his, and soothed her. Thoughts like these might float through a man's mind involuntarily, getting no utterance; but it horrified him to hear them from the lips of a child. Was she a child? Dr Maurice said to himself once more, with an inward groan, that his little Norah, his dream-child of the fairy tales, was gone, and he should find her no more. 'And then it rather vexes one to be so little,' she said, suddenly drying her eyes, 'because of Clara. Clara is not twelve yet, and she is much bigger than I am. She can reach to these roses--look--while I can't get near them; and they are the only roses we have now. But, after all, though it may be nice to be tall, it doesn't matter very much, do you think, for a woman? So mamma says; and girls are just as often little as tall--in books.' 'For my part, I am fond of little women,' said Dr Maurice, and this time he laughed within himself. She kept him between the two, changing from childhood to womanhood without knowing it. 'But tell me, who is Clara? I want to know about your new friends here.' 'Clara is Clara Burton, and very like him,' said Norah. 'I thought I should be fond of her at first, because she is my cousin; but I am not fond of her. Ned is her brother. I like him better. He is a horsey, doggy sort of boy; but then he has always lived in the country, and he knows no better. One can't blame him for that, do you think?' 'Oh, no,' said Dr Maurice, with great seriousness; 'one can't blame him for that.' The man's heart grew glad over the child's talk. He could have listened to her running on about her friends for ever. 'And then there was--some one else,' said Norah, instinctively drawing herself up; 'not exactly a boy; a--gentleman. We saw him in town, and then we saw him here; first with that horrible man, Mr Golden, and another day with the Burtons. But you are not to think badly of him for that. He was--on our side.' 'Who is this mysterious personage, I wonder?' said Dr Maurice smilingly; but this time it was not a laugh or a groan, but a little shivering sensation of pain that ran through him, he could not tell why. 'He was more like Fortunatus than any one,' said Norah. 'But he could not be like Fortunatus in everything, for he said he was poor, like us--though that might be only, as I say it myself, to spite Clara. Well, he was grown up--taller than you are, Dr Maurice--with nice curling sort of hair, all in little twists and rings, and beautiful eyes. They flashed up so when mamma spoke. Mamma was very, very angry talking to that horrible man at our own very door. Fancy, he had dared to go and call and leave his horrid card. I tore it into twenty pieces, and stamped upon it. It was silly, I suppose; but to think he should dare to call--at our own very house----' 'I am getting dreadfully confused, Norah, between the beautiful eyes and the horrible man. I don't know what I am about. Which was which?'