"Oh, thank you so much!" exclaimed Belle, in what some one had once called her "Parisian" manner. "It was so careless of me to drop it, and I wouldn't have lost it for the world. Things so easily roll away on the shore, don't they?" "I suppose they do," replied the colonel. "It certainly isn't wise to send your trinkets spinning about the sands." "I value that one, too," said Belle, shaking her curls, "because, you see, it was a present. A friend of mother's gave it to me on my last birthday. He was going to choose a book at first--he always sent me books before, the most terrible ones: Shakespeare, and Lamb's 'Essays,' and Ruskin, and stupid things like that, which I shan't ever care to read, even when I'm grown up--so this birthday I asked him if he would give me something really nice; and he laughed, and brought me this dear little bangle, and said he expected it would suit Miss Curly-locks better than solid reading." "Ugh!" grunted her new acquaintance, with so ambiguous an expression that Belle could not make out whether he sympathized or not; but as he put down his paper, and seemed quite ready to listen to her, she went on. "It's very nice at Silversands. Mother and I have been here nearly a fortnight. We think the air's bracing, and the lodgings are really not bad for a little place like this. One doesn't expect a hotel." "Are you staying in Marine Terrace?" "Yes; it's the nicest part, because you get the view of the sea. I don't like the rooms near the station at all. Mother looked at some of them first, but there were such dreadfully vulgar children stopping there. 'This won't do, Belle,' she said. 'I couldn't have you in the same house with people of that sort.'" "Is your name Belle?" "Yes, Isabelle Stuart; but it's generally shortened to Belle. Mother says a pet name somehow seems to suit me better. Last winter I went to a party dressed all in blue, and everybody called me 'Little Bluebell,' and asked if I came from fairyland." She paused here, thinking the old gentleman might take the opportunity to put in a compliment; but he did not rise to the occasion, so she continued,-- "Other people asked if I were one of the bluebells of Scotland; but we're not Scotch, although our name's Stuart. My father was English. I can't remember him properly, I was so little when he died, but mother always says I'm his very image." "Rubbish!" growled the colonel suddenly. "Why!" exclaimed Belle, in astonishment, "how can you tell? You didn't know him? He was very tall and fair, mother says, and _so_ handsome. She cries when I talk about him, so I don't like to speak of him very often." "What is she doing for you in the way of lessons? Is it all parties and trinkets, or do you ever do anything useful?" asked her companion. "Of course I have lessons," replied Belle with dignity, feeling rather hurt at his tone. "I learn French, and drawing, and music, and dancing, and a great many other things." "And which do you like best?"