So the order was issued, and Mrs. Pritchard found her duties considerably lightened, for Bertie troubled her with little of his society, and was nearly always to be found perched silently upon the library window-seat, sometimes with a book on his knees, but more often merely resting his chin on his hand and gazing intently either at the Squire in his leather-covered chair before the writing-table, or else out of the window. His daily walk was always the same—to visit David and the sandhills by the sea, whilst his days were spent in quiet contentment in the old library. It was an odd life for a little child to lead, as odd as the whole strange chain of circumstances that had led him to this new home. Things were in this state by the time Sunday came round; and the brief interview with Queenie in the churchyard was the first incident that had occurred to rouse the child out of the dreamy state in which he had been sunk ever since his return to conscious life. His eyes were brighter as he walked home beside the Squire, and he looked about him with more of natural, childish interest than he had ever evinced before. When they stood together in the hall, the child looked up in the Squire’s face with the first smile that had been seen as yet in those wistful dark eyes. “May I have my dinner down-stairs to-day with you?” he asked. “Because it’s Sunday, you know.” The Squire looked meditatively into the child’s face, and asked in his turn,— “Why should I be more troubled with you on a Sunday than on any other day?” Bertie smiled once more quite fearlessly. It had been observed from the very first that the child had never appeared in the least afraid of the Squire, whose rather rough manner and sharp way of speaking often made him appear a formidable being to those who did not understand his truer nature. “I won’t be any trouble,” answered Bertie, in his frank and serious way, “but I should like to come. Please will you let me?” “Very well, I will allow it to-day, since your heart seems set upon it; but you must not take it as a precedent.” “Oh no, of course not,” answered Bertie; “it’s only on Sundays that I want to stay with you for dinner.” And then he mounted the stairs, to tell Mrs. Pritchard of the arrangement he had just made. The housekeeper was less surprised than she would have been four days ago. She had observed how readily the child’s presence was tolerated in the library, and she began to indulge the secret hope that the companionship of the little boy might beguile the Squire out of his long-established habits of sorrowful reserve and gloom.