"No, that I shall not do," was the calm reply, "because I have told you many times that you are not to spring out and frighten Sunbeam." Disappointment and dismay was in the pair of brown eyes raised so beseechingly. "Oh, Auntie Monnie, do forgive me, do! Sunbeam isn't frightened of me. She's quite grave now." But Monica drove steadily on, leaving the little boy in a tempest of tears upon the road. "May I not intercede for the small culprit?" Randolph said. "It seems rather—" "Heartless and hard-hearted, eh? But a little discipline is good for Chuckles. He never gets it from Aunt Dannie, so I must make up her deficiencies. And it is no hardship for the imp to run home. We shall be there in five minutes." They were turning up a drive now, and soon arrived at a red bricked gable house. The sun-blinds were down at every window; a lawn in front was gay with flower-beds, and Randolph could not help exclaiming: "This is not my idea of a genuine farmhouse." "No? You must wait till you see my dairies and all my live stock. Here is Aunt Dannie." A frail little white-haired lady stood at the door. Randolph stooped down and kissed her. She was his mother's sister, and he was her favourite nephew. She led him into a long low room, dark and cool after the glare of the sunshine outside. The table was laid for supper. There was a sense of peace and restfulness in the house that charmed Randolph. He cut short his aunt's profuse apologies. "My dear boy, we wait on ourselves; there seems so much to do, and so few to do it. But you will not expect a well-ordered country mansion. Not that Monica is a bad housekeeper. She is here, there, and everywhere—in the dairy, in the kitchen, in the fields; but she has method, and everything goes by clockwork. I will take you to your room. It is our only spare room, and the roof slopes and the floor is uneven, but—" "Now, look here, Aunt Dannie, I've come down here for quiet and peace of mind. I have begun to feel the atmosphere already, so don't you point me out the drawbacks. I call this the picture of a prosperous homestead." Left alone in his room, Randolph leant out of the low window taking in the extensive view beyond the garden. "Thank heaven!" he ejaculated to himself. "There will be no Society girls to entertain. I'm sick of them all!" When he came downstairs he found a clean, demure-faced Chuckles waiting for him. "We're having a chicken for supper," Chuckles whispered to him; "the poor fing was made to die yesterday. And I put pins in your pincushion for you. Did you see them?" "How did you get home so quickly?" Randolph asked, hoisting him on his shoulder, to his delight, and carrying him into the dining-room. He was very light and small, with a shock of flaxen curls which consorted strangely with his blazing brown eyes and dark curling lashes.