"I thought of that, too," the doctor answered, while a slight shadow passed over his face, "but she seems to think not. However, I'm not in a hurry Pearl, and I just think I'll wait for you." After Camilla and Jim and the doctor had gone that night, and Teddy and Billy and Jimmy had gone to bed, Pearl crept into her father's arms and laid her head on his broad shoulder. "Pa," she said drowsily, "I'm glad I'm home." Her father patted her little brown hand. "So am I, acushla," he said; after a pause he whispered, "yer a good wee girl, Pearlie," but Pearl's tired little eyes had closed in sleep. Mrs. Watson laid more wood on the fire, which crackled merrily up the chimney. "Lay her down, John dear," she whispered. "Yer arms'll ache, man." On the back of the stove the teakettle simmered drowsily. There was no sound in the house but the regular breathing of the sleeping children. The fire burned low, but John Watson still sat holding his little sleeping girl in his arms. Outside the snow was beginning to fall. CONCLUSION CONVINCING CAMILLA "If you can convince me, Jim, that you are more irresponsible and more in need of a guiding hand than Mrs. Francis--why then I'll--I'll be--" Jim sprang from his chair. "You'll be what, Camilla? Tell me quick," he cried eagerly. "I'll be--convinced," she said demurely, looking down. Jim sat down again and sighed. "Will you be anything else?" he asked. "Convince me first," she said firmly. "I think I can do it," he said, "I always have to write down what I want to do each day, and what I need to buy when I come in here, and once, when I wrote my list, nails, coffee, ploughshare, mail, I forgot to put on it, 'come back,' and perhaps you may remember I came here that evening and stayed and stayed--I was trying to think what to do next." "That need not worry you again, Jim," she said sweetly. "I can easily remember that, and will tell you every time." "To 'come back'?" he said. "Thank you, Camilla, and I will do it too." She laughed. "Having to make a list isn't anything. Poor Mrs. Francis makes a list and then loses it, then makes a second list, and puts on it to find the first list, and then loses that; and Jim, she once made biscuits and forgot the shortening." "I made biscuits once and forgot the flour," Jim declared proudly. Camilla shook her head. "And, Camilla," Jim said gravely, "I am really very irresponsible, you know Nellie Slater--she is a pretty girl, isn't she?" "A very pretty girl," Camilla agreed. "About your size--fluffy hair--" "Wavy, Jim," Camilla corrected. "Hers is fluffy, yours is wavy," Jim said firmly--"lovely dark eyes--well, she was standing by the window, just before the lamps were lighted, and I really am very absent-minded you know--I don't know how it happened that I mistook her for you." Camilla reached out her hand. He seized it eagerly. "Jim--I am convinced," she said softly. Fifteen minutes afterwards Camilla said: