Life had indeed become a very wonderful thing for little Allumette since her awakening to the consciousness of her surroundings in the cheerful hospital ward. Everything since then had been so beautiful--so wonderful! Nothing but kindness had been her portion; and to crown all had come Miss Madge’s visits, upon the last of which she had heard that the cobbler and his wife--her best friends--had been sent down to live in a farmhouse close to the lady’s future home, and that Allumette herself was to go there as soon as she was well enough to leave the hospital, to live in the country always with her old friends, and by-and-by to be trained for service in Miss Madge’s own house, with the prospect of becoming her little maid in the future. Miss Madge had told her all this just before she was to be married; and since then the child had not seen her. For, when she reached this delightful place, Mr. and Mrs. Brook were away upon their wedding trip, and only to-day were they to return. “Hark to the bells!” cried Mrs. Gregg suddenly. “That means that the carriage is in sight of the village. Run, ducky! It will pass the place I showed you this morning. Take your posy and run and see them go by!” A huge and very tasteful arrangement in brightly-tinted autumn leaves and flowers, tied with a white riband, lay upon the table. Little Allumette started up, tied on her hat, seized her bouquet, and started off like an arrow from a bow. She was strong enough to run a short distance now, and she knew just where the carriage would pass. “They be a-coomin’, ducky!” cried the old cobbler, who was now working busily in the garden, rejoicing in the sort of toil to which he had been brought up, and which seemed to infuse new vigour into his bent frame. He and his wife both appeared to have taken a new lease of life since coming down into the country. It had been one of their unfulfilled dreams to save enough to leave the cruel city and make a little home in some quiet country place such as both remembered in their youth. But they had long given up hoping for it, when the unexpected offer from Miss Madge brought about its realisation. The child ran swiftly down the sloping meadow to the stile at the end. The road ran along just below, and from that vantage ground she would see the carriage pass, and be able to throw her posy into Miss Madge’s lap. She could not yet think of her as anything but Miss Madge, though she practised the new name conscientiously with Mrs. Gregg. But hardly had she reached the stile before she uttered a little exclamation of rapture, for there was a tall familiar figure standing beside it, his face turned away, watching for the arrival of the carriage. At the sound of the pattering feet he turned and smiled. “Little Allumette!” he exclaimed; and, lifting her up, he set her upon the stile, where she could see everything to the greatest advantage. “Oh, sir!” she exclaimed in a sort of ecstacy; and he laughed as he said--