“Oh, you stupid, stupid children!” cried the poor little heroine, “don’t you know mamma, though she is so pretty, is not a young lady like other people that are going to be married; don’t you know people talk about it, and laugh at her, and say she is foolish? I have heard them do it!” cried Loo. “I heard them in Summerhayes to-day talking and scolding about our mamma. She knows best what to do—better than all of them. She will never be unkind to us, or stop loving us. Oh, only think if she knew that people said such things—it would kill her! I heard them, and I thought I should have died. And now, children,” said Loo, solemnly, “what we’ve got to do is to go down to mamma, not jumping or making a noise like great babies, but quiet and serious; and to tell her that she is to do what she thinks best, and never mind what people say; and that we—we,” sobbed the little girl, vainly trying to preserve her composure, as she brought out word after word with a gush of tears—“we’ll stand by her and trust in her, and never believe anything. That is what we must go and say.” After she had finished her speech Loo fell into a little passion of crying, in which she partly lost the slight murmurs and remonstrances of her calmer and wondering audience; but passion as usual carried the day. When Mrs Clifford’s bell rang the children went down-stairs, looking rather scared, in a kind of procession, Loo coming last with Alf, who had to be held tightly by the hand lest he should break out into gambols, and destroy all the solemnity of the proceeding. Mrs Clifford was sitting by the fire when they went in, in an attitude of thought. The candles were not lighted, and it was very easy to suppose that mamma herself looked sad, and was quite in a state of mind to be thus addressed. Harry and Mary, rather ashamed of themselves, were already carrying on a quiet scuffle at the door when Loo came up to them. “You go first, Harry”—“No, you,” they were saying to each other. “Oh, you stupid, stupid children, you have no feeling!” cried Loo, bitterly, as she swept past them. Mrs Clifford looked up with a smile, and held out her hand, which she expected to be grasped immediately by a crowd of little fingers, but the mother’s looks were dreamy to-night, and some one else was before her children in her thoughts. She was startled when she felt Loo’s little cold hand put into hers, and woke up and pushed her chair back from the fire to look at the little things who stood huddled together before her. “What is the matter?” said Mrs Clifford.