Mr. Wycherly had consulted Mrs. Methuen on many matters connected with the child. For one thing he had begged her to assist him in developing her sense of humour. Whereupon she sent Jane-Anne both the "Alices," and suggested she should be allowed to see _Punch_ every week. She also gave her "German Popular Stories" and "A Flat Iron for a Farthing." These works were all of absorbing interest and somewhat interrupted Jane-Anne’s study of Lord Byron, as had been intended. _Punch_ she took to her heart at once; not on account of the Immortal Jester’s humour, but because of the beautiful ladies depicted by Mr. Du Maurier. These she whole-heartedly admired and set herself to imitate. All the same, Jane-Anne was getting on. She laughed very often now, sometimes from sheer joy at being in a world where there were people so kind and delightful as Mrs. Methuen and Mr. Wycherly; sometimes because things really did seem funny. She began to realise, too, that it was possible to jest; that Mr. Wycherly often said things that he did not mean; and that it was conceivable that you might love a person with all your heart and soul and yet be perfectly cognisant of their little weaknesses and oddities. Mr. and Mrs. Methuen taught her this, quite unconsciously, while she waited upon them when they lunched with Mr. Wycherly. Jane-Anne was a quick study. That night as she waited upon "the master" at dinner, he unfolded to her Mrs. Methuen’s plan, and Jane-Anne at once burst into floods of tears, declaring hotly that she’d rather be his parlour-maid than anybody’s nurse, "not if it was a prince." That she didn’t want to wait upon a horrid little baby when there was her own dear master to wait upon, and she’d promised Master Montagu! Very gently, Mr. Wycherly explained the arrangement, and when she heard of the uniform the training lost some of its horror. "I shan’t have to go for years and years, shall I?" she asked. "Certainly not for many years; never at all if you don’t like it." "And I’m to practise on Mrs. Cox’s baby?" "You are to take care—the greatest care—of Mrs. Cox’s baby for a short time once a week." "Do you want me to?" Candidly, Mr. Wycherly wanted nothing less. He detested schemes for the ultimate employment of Jane-Anne. To him, everything suggested seemed incongruous and infeasible, but he mistrusted his own judgment in practical matters and bowed before the youthful wisdom and general competence of Mrs. Methuen. "I think," he said guardedly, "that every woman ought to know how to manage a baby." "I wonder," she said dreamily, "if Lord Byron would approve of it?" "As we have no means of finding out, let’s take it that he will," he answered drily. "I don’t like the name Norland," she objected. "It will be years before you are even ready to apply for admission to the Norland Institute," said Mr. Wycherly. "If it’s an institution, I’m not going," she said firmly.