And Queenie marched away with her head held very high in the air, and Bertie, after gazing after her very much astonished for some minutes, quietly turned away and wandered home, not at all disturbed by the outbreak, only regarding it as a new development of the odd disposition of his little new friend. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER VII. THE FUGITIVE. QUEENIE was very much surprised when she found that Bertie had taken her at her word, and had not tried to follow her or coax her out of her fit of temper. As soon as her pride would allow her, she turned to look back, and saw Bertie quietly climbing the fence and pursuing his way home again, without a single lingering backward glance at his offended companion. Queenie was so much astonished by this unexpected display of spirit, that she stood quite still for several minutes, and then suddenly began to laugh. It occurred to her that Bertie was only doing exactly what she would have done in his place, and she was sensible enough as well as generous enough to see that she could not reasonably take offence at conduct so very like her own. “After all, it was my fault,” she said to herself. “I told him to go, which wasn’t quite polite, as he was my guest. I hope papa will not come after me and ask where he is. He would not like me to be rude. Bertie was rude too; he had no business to speak of me and David as if we were anything to do with one another—and to call him _gooder_ than me!” Queenie often became ungrammatical when she was put out. “I’ll soon show him that I’m not going to put up with that sort of thing.” The little girl tossed her curly head, and her face assumed its expression of greatest dignity, which was, however, soon replaced by a look of regret and sorrow. “But I wish he had not gone, all the same. I do like having a boy to play with, and he was a nice little boy, I think, although he’s not a bit like any one I’ve ever seen before.” Queenie pursued her way to the house in rather a melancholy mood, feeling as if a promising beginning to friendship had suddenly been nipped in the bud. She was afraid to stay in the garden, lest her father should see her and ask what had become of Bertie, so she wandered rather aimlessly into the house and up the staircase to the corridor where the nurseries were situated. These were shut off from the rest of the house by a red baize door, and as Queenie heard this swing to behind her this afternoon, and saw the row of doors belonging to the “boys’ rooms,” which were never banged now, and only shut in cold emptiness and vacancy, she said once more softly to herself,— “I do hate term-time. It is quite horrid when all the boys are away.” Then Queenie stopped short suddenly, for she saw something that puzzled, and for a moment rather startled her.