So she remained unaware of mothers and unaware of affection. She never played with other children. Andrews, her nurse--as behooved one employed in a house about which there "was talk" bore herself with a lofty and exclusive air. "My rule is to keep myself to myself," she said in the kitchen, "and to look as if I was the one that would turn up noses, if noses was to be turned up. There's those that would snatch away their children if I let Robin begin to make up to them." But one morning, when Robin was watching some quarrelsome sparrows, an old acquaintance surprised Andrews by appearing in the Gardens and engaged her in a conversation so delightful that Robin was forgotten to the extent of being allowed to follow her sparrows round a clump of shrubbery out of sight. It was while she watched them that she heard footsteps that stopped near her. She looked up. A big boy in Highland kilts and bonnet and sporan was standing by her. He spread and curved his red mouth, then began to run and prance round in a circle, capering like a Shetland pony to exhibit at once his friendliness and his prowess. After a minute or two he stopped, breathing fast and glowing. "My pony in Scotland does that. His name is Chieftain. I'm called Donal. What are you called?" "Robin," she answered, her lips and voice trembling with joy. He was so beautiful. They began to play together while Andrews' friend recounted intimate details of a country house scandal. Donal picked leaves from a lilac bush. Robin learned that if you laid a leaf flat on the seat of a bench you could prick beautiful patterns on the leaf's greenness. Donal had--in his rolled down stocking--a little dirk. He did the decoration with the point of this while Robin looked on, enthralled. Through what means children so quickly convey to each other the entire history of their lives is a sort of occult secret. Before Donal was taken home, Robin knew that he lived in Scotland and had been brought to London on a visit, that his other name was Muir, that the person he called "mother" was a woman who took care of him. He spoke of her quite often. "I will bring one of my picture-books to-morrow," he said grandly. "Can you read at all?" "No," answered Robin, adoring him. "What are picture books?" "Haven't you any?" he blurted out. She lifted her eyes to the glowing blueness of his and said quite simply, "I haven't anything." His old nurse's voice came from the corner where she sat. "I must go back to Nanny," he said, feeling, somehow, as if he had been running fast. "I'll come to-morrow and bring _two_ picture books." He put his strong little eight-year-old arms round her and kissed her full on the mouth. It was the first time, for Robin. Andrews did not kiss. There was no one else. "Don't you like to be kissed?" said Donal, uncertain because she looked so startled and had not kissed him back.