"You are very random, you know, Harry," said Miss Castlemaine, slowly. "You talk to young ladies without meaning anything--but they may not detect that. Take care you do not go too far some day, and find yourself in a mesh." Harry Castlemaine turned his bright face on his cousin. "I never talk seriously but to one person, Mary Ursula. And that's Ethel." "Harry," cried the young girl, with flashing eyes, "you are not fair to me." "And now, have you any commands for the Commodore?" went on Harry lightly, and taking no notice of Ethel's rebuke. "I am going to the Hutt." They said they had none; and he left the room. Mary turned to Ethel. "My dear--if you have no objection to confide in me--is there anything between you and Harry?" "Nothing, Mary," was the answer, and Ethel blushed the soft blush of girlish modesty as she said it. "Last year he teased me very much, making me often angry; but latterly he has been better. The idea of my marrying him!--when we have grown up together like brother and sister! It would seem hardly proper. I like Harry very much indeed as a brother; but as to marrying him, why, I'd rather never be married at all. Here's the carriage coming back! Mamma must have forgotten something." Mrs. Castlemaine's carriage was seen winding round the drive. They heard her get out at the door and hold a colloquy with Flora. She came to the red parlour looking angry. "Where's Harry?" she demanded, in the sharp, unkindly tones that so often grated on the ear of those offending her, as she threw her eyes round the room. "Harry is not here, mamma," replied Ethel. "I understood he was here," suspiciously spoke Mrs. Castlemaine. "He went out a minute or two ago," said Ethel. "I think he is gone to Commodore Teague's." "He is like an eel," was the pettish rejoinder. "You never know when you have him. As to that vulgar, gossiping old Teague, that they make so much of and are always running after, I can't think what they see in him." "Perhaps it is his gossip that they like," suggested Ethel. "Well, I want Harry. He has been beating Flora." "I don't think he beat her, mamma." "Oh, you great story-teller!" exclaimed Flora, putting in her head. "He shook me till all my bones rattled." Mrs. Castlemaine shut the door with a click. And the next that they saw, was Miss Flora dressed in her best and going off with her mamma in the carriage. "With this injudicious treatment the child has hardly a chance to become better," murmured Mary Ursula. "Ethel, have you a mind for a walk?" "Yes: with you." They dressed themselves and started for the village, walking lightly over the crisp snow, under the clear blue sky. Miss Castlemaine was bound for the Grey Nunnery; Ethel protesting she would do no act or part towards helping her to enter it, went off to see some of the fishermen's wives on the cliff.