"Hilary, pack your boxes, and get ready to go up to London with me on Monday week. If you are seventeen, you are old enough to pay visits, and we will stay for a fortnight with my old friend Miss Carr, in Kensington. She is a clever woman, and I will talk to her and see what can be done. I can't work miracles, but I will do what I can to please you. May I be allowed to have another cup of tea, Miss Seventeen?" "Poor, dear, old father! Don't look so subdued. You may have a dozen if you like. Monday next! How lovely! You are the dearest father in all the world!" Mr Bertrand shrugged his shoulders. "When I give you your own way," he said drily. "Pass the cake, Lettice. If I have three grown-up daughters on my hands, I must make every effort to keep up my strength." Lettice and Norah had a little conversation on the stairs as they went upstairs to change their dresses for dinner. "It's very nice for Hilary, this going up to London; but it doesn't do _us_ any good. When is something going to happen for _us_?" "I suppose we shall have to wait for our turn," sighed Lettice dolefully; but that very same evening an unexpected excitement took place in the quiet household, and though the Mouse's prophecy was fulfilled, inasmuch as it could hardly be called an incident of a cheerful nature, it was yet fated to lead to great and far-reaching results. CHAPTER THREE. AN UNEXPECTED GUEST. The old grandfather's clock was just striking six o'clock when Raymond and Bob, the two public schoolboys, came home from their afternoon excursion. They walked slowly up the drive, supporting between them the figure of a young fellow a few years older than themselves, who hopped painfully on one foot, and was no sooner seated on the oak bench in the hall, than he rested his head against the rails, and went off into a dead faint. The boys shouted at the pitch of their voices, whereupon Mr Bertrand rushed out of his sanctum, followed by every other member of his household. "Good gracious! Who is it? What is the matter? Where did he come from? Has he had an accident?" cried the girls in chorus, while Miss Briggs ran off for sal volatile and other remedies. The stranger was a tall, lanky youth, about eighteen years of age, with curly brown hair and well-cut features, and he made a pathetic figure leaning back in the big oak seat. "He's the son of old Freer, the Squire of Brantmere," explained Raymond, as he busied himself unloosing the lad's collar and tie. "We have met him several times when we have been walking. Decent fellow--Harrow-- reading at home for college, and hates it like poison. We were coming a short cut over the mountains, when he slipped on a bit of ice, and twisted his ankle trying to keep up. We had an awful time getting him back. He meant to stay at the inn to-night, as his people are away, and it was too dark to go on, but he looks precious bad. Couldn't we put him up here?"