"Perhaps I was hasty, Nettie, last night; but Richard, you know, poor fellow," said Susan, "was not to be put off. It won't make any difference between you and me, Nettie dear? We have always been so united, whatever has happened; and the children are so fond of you; and as for me," said Mrs Fred, putting back the strings of her cap, and pressing her handkerchief upon her eyes, "with my health, and after all I have gone through, how I could ever exist without you, I can't tell; and Richard will be so pleased----" "I don't want to hear anything about Richard, please," said Nettie--"not so far as I am concerned. I should have taken you out, and taken care of you, had you chosen me; but you can't have two people, you know. One is enough for anybody. Never mind what we are talking about, Freddy. It is only your buttons--nothing else. As long as you were my business, I should have scorned to complain," said Nettie, with a little quiver of her lip. "Nothing would have made me forsake you, or leave you to yourself; but now you are somebody else's business; and to speak of it making no difference, and Richard being pleased, and so forth, as if I had nothing else to do in the world, and wanted to go back to the colony! It is simply not my business any longer," cried Nettie, rising impatiently from her chair--"that is all that can be said. But I shan't desert you till I deliver you over to my successor, Susan--don't fear." "Then you don't feel any love for us, Nettie! It was only because you could not help it. Children, Nettie is going to leave us," said Mrs Fred, in a lamentable voice. "Then who is to be instead of Nettie? Oh, look here--I know--it's Chatham," said the little girl. "I hate Chatham," said Freddy, with a little shriek. "I shall go where Nettie goes--all my things are in my box. Nettie is going to take me; she loves me best of you all. I'll kick Chatham if he touches me."