"She has promised me she will stay here with you," said Justin. His voice sounded helpless, and his eyes met Anstice's with a hint of appeal in them. She came to his rescue, and said cheerfully: "Yes, we're going to have good times together, I hope, Ruffie. I am not a governess, you mustn't think of me as one, for I'm not half clever enough to teach your sisters." "You're a new mother," said Ruffie, scowling heavily at her. "We've got our own mother. She's dead, and we don't want another. If Dad doesn't want you to go with him, we don't want you to stay with us, so you can go home where you came from." Anstice shook her head and smiled, whilst her dimples came in play. "When I got up this morning, Ruffie," she said, "I looked out of my window, and I saw such a beautiful corner of the world, that I knelt down and said my prayers before it. And I said to myself when I got up: 'Every one who lives in such beauty must be happy and kind.' That's what I mean to be; will you join me?" The scowl faded away. Ruffie was now regarding her curiously. "Are you frightened of things?" he asked. "But all women are, we know them. First they try to frighten us, then they get frightened themselves, and then they go." "If I don't go till I am frightened," said Anstice, "you will have to wait a long time, Ruffie. But this is my home now as well as yours. I shall soon fit into my corner, you see if I don't! And one person determined last night to be friends with me and give me a welcome. I mean to see more of him. Do you know his name? Joshua." Ruffie's face was a picture. Interest, curiosity and ripples of mischief showed themselves in his eyes. "Did he prick you?" he asked impishly. "I should think not. He thought he was in a prison with hot, heavy clouds suffocating him. First he thought he was under the earth, but he couldn't burrow a way out. Then he turned head over heels, and was preparing to give a squeal, when suddenly the clouds lifted, and then he was lifted. In a few minutes, he was back again in his usual bedroom, and if you asked him about it this morning, he would tell you it was a bad dream." "We must come to breakfast." Justin spoke abruptly. He very gently put Ruffie back upon his couch amongst his cushions, and Anstice left the room saying to Ruffie: "We will see each other later on." Justin and she had hardly taken their places at the breakfast table in the library, when the door was flung open, and the two little girls, arm in arm, came in most defiantly. "Good morning," said their father gravely, "come and speak to this lady. She is going to be a second mother to you." They stood perfectly still, astonishment and disgust plainly discernible on their faces. "She's only another governess. You're pretending, Dad." The taller of the two, Josephine by name, was spokeswoman.