"Ha, ha, ha!" says Dulce, equally unmindful of the stormy past. "How sweet they looked, naughty things. And how they _did_ bark and bite. Dr. Watts should have been here to see them." "I wonder will they get that bone back?" says Roger, turning to her, all animosity forgotten in the pleasurable excitement of the moment. "Let us come and see," exclaims she, with considerable animation, and in the friendliest tone imaginable. She glances up at him from under her long lashes with one of her brightest and sunniest smiles, and moves a step nearer to him. "We must run if we want to be in time for the finish," says Roger--"come." He takes her hand, and together they move towards the door. They are, apparently, as happy and as good friends as if no harsh words had ever passed between them. "Going out now," says Julia, as they pass the low wicker chair in which she is lounging, "so late?" "Don't be long, Dulce," says Portia, in her plaintive way. "I miss you when you are out of my sight." "I shan't be any time," says Dulce. "Mr. Gower said it was going to rain, and it is a long way to the yard," says Julia again. "Stay here, and keep dry." "I suppose Gower is not infallible," says Roger, hastily. "I think it will not rain." "I think so too," says Dulce, adorably; "and as for Mr. Gower, I only know one thing; I shall never give _him_ any of my own cake again, because he looked just as if he was going to die, or have a tooth drawn, all the time he was eating it to-day." Then they disappear, still hand-in-hand, in search of the refractory puppies, and Portia, turning to Sir Mark, says softly: "What am I to think now? How is it with them? Have they--" "Yes; quite that," says Sir Mark, airily. "All is forgotten; the storm is over--not even a breeze remains. The delicate charms of two snarling puppies have put an end to strife--for the present. Let us be grateful for small mercies--_and_ the puppies." "It is very wonderful," says Portia, still showing some soft surprise. CHAPTER XI. "There's something in a flying horse." --PETER BELL. "For of fortunes sharpe adversite, The worst kind of infortune is this, A man that hath been in prosperite And it remember, whan it passed is!" --CHAUCER. "WHERE are you going, Uncle Christopher?" asks Dulce, as Sir Christopher enters the small drawing-room, booted and spurred for a long journey. Portia, in the distance, bending over an easel; Julia is forming some miraculous flower, that never yet was seen by land or sea, on a coarse towel, with some crewel wools; the Boodie is lying on her little fat stomach, drawing diligently with a slate and pencil; Dulce, charmingly idle, is leaning back in a lounging chair, doing nothing. "To Warminster," says Sir Christopher "What shall I bring you girls from that sleepy little town?"