Comethup got it out trippingly; it was always a difficult matter, in those early years, to get the uncouth thing off his tongue. The girl looked puzzled, and begged him to repeat it; he did so, with a flush upon his face. He was already beginning to understand, by the surprise with which the name was always received, that there was something remarkable and even ridiculous about it. But this girl apparently liked it; laughed softly and turned it over on her tongue, and said "Comethup," with a little break in the middle of it; "yes, it's a pretty name." Comethup was gratified, and had a sudden wish that he had paid her the same compliment. They stood awkwardly and shyly looking at each other, until the slow, heavy steps of some one trudging through the dead leaves bestirred them to a recollection of time and place. "That's Mrs. Blissett," said the child with a sigh, "and I shall have go to bed. Come back here where she won't see you. Can't you hear her coming, and grumbling to herself all the way?" The question ended with a little ripple of laughter, and Comethup, glancing at the child, saw all her white teeth showing in a smile, and her eyes dancing with it. She drew him back among the shadows of the trees while the heavy-footed, murmuring Mrs. Blissett pounded solemnly along toward the house. They stood quite still, until the footsteps had died away, and then, to Comethup's great surprise and consternation, this small girl-child caught him by his jacket, kissed him swiftly, and cried in a breath: "Good-night, Comethup; come and see me to-morrow," and sped away from him through the trees. Comethup stood, in a dazed condition, looking after her for some moments, and softly rubbing his cheek with one hand where her lips had touched him; and then, with very mixed emotions, set off for home. But though the garden was the same, and though the wind whispered through the trees, and the dead leaves drove at him, it had no further terrors for him; had, indeed, become a place of wonder and delight, as everything else seemed to become in his small world. His father, his little room at home, his mother's sleeping place among the green mounds in the churchyard, the captain and the building of the forts, Brian and his reckless expeditions--all these were things of delight to the boy. And now, in the midst of them, had sprung up a new wonder, growing beautifully in the midst of the terrors which had seemed to be about her. He went home with a fast-beating heart, full of his new discovery, and anxious to unbosom himself regarding it to some one of sympathy.