Lena ran up in her short pink frock, her light curls flying. "Miss Barbary is always afraid when she hears Don bark," she said to us. "She will not go near the yard; she thinks he'll bite her." "I will teach you how to make friends with him," said Tod: "though he would never hurt you, Miss Barbary. Come here and pat his head whilst I hold him; call him by his name gently. Once he knows you, he would protect you from harm with his life." She complied with ready obedience, though the roses left her cheeks. "There," said Tod, loosing the dog, and letting her pat him at leisure, "see how gentle he is; how affectionately he looks up at you!" "Please not to think me very silly!" she pleaded earnestly, as though beseeching pardon for a sin. "I have never been used to dogs. We do not keep dogs in France. At least very few people do. Oh dear!" Something that she carried in her left hand wrapped in paper had dropped on to the lawn. Don pounced upon it. "Oh, please take it from him! please, please!" she cried in terror. Tod laughed, and extricated the little parcel. "It has some valuable old lace in it of Mrs. Todhetley's," she explained as she thanked him. "I am taking it home to mend." "You mend old lace famously, I hear," said Tod, as we walked with her to the entrance gate. "Yes, I think I do it nearly as well as the nuns who taught me." "Have you been in a convent?" "Only for my education. I was an externe--a daily pupil. My aunt lived next door to it. I went every morning at eight o'clock and returned home at six in the evening to supper." "Did you get no dinner?" asked Tod. She took the question literally. "I had dinner and collation at school; breakfast and supper at home. That was the way in our town with the externes at the convent. We were Protestants, you see, so my aunt liked me to be at home on Sundays. Thank you for teaching Don to know me: and now I will say good morning to you." I was holding the gate open for her to pass out, when Ben Gibbon went by, a gun carelessly held over his shoulder. He touched his hat to us, and we gave him a slight nod in reply. Miss Barbary said "Good day, Mr. Gibbon." Tod drew down his displeased lips. He had already taken a liking to the girl--so had I, for that matter--she was a true lady, and Mr. Ben Gibbon, a brother to the gamekeeper at Chavasse Grange, could not boast of a particularly shining character. "Do you know _him_, Miss Barbary?" asked Tod. "Be quiet, Don!" he cried to the dog, which had begun to growl when he saw Gibbon. "He comes to our house sometimes to see papa. Please pardon me for keeping you waiting," she added to me, as I still held back the gate. "That gun is pointed this way and it may go off." Tod was amused. "You seem to dread guns as much as you dread dogs, Miss Barbary. I will walk home with you," he said, as she at last came through, the gun having got to a safe distance.