“Heigho! the man has quite forgiven himself for a life full of meannesses,” she yawned. She sat down wearily in her chair by the stove, and as she got out her proofs to correct for the press, she sighed: “Thank heaven, the last page!... Heigho! I am weary....” She sank back in her chair; and as her eyes closed, her hand upon the last corrected page, she fell fast asleep. When Caroline awoke in the greying dawn, the small Betty was sitting in a chair near the boy’s bed, solemnly reading by the guttering candle. The child had set a kettle to boil; and tea-cups and an old brown teapot of the kind that is called toby shone invitingly on the little table whereon the candle feebly struggled against the cold light of the coming day. Caroline roused, and, walking to the child, she stroked the dainty little head. Betty rose, fetched the kettle that purred on the stove, and filled the teapot; and, when she had let it stand for a spell, she drew off a cup of tea. She looked round. Caroline was kneeling by the bed of the sleeping boy, her head buried in her arms. Betty slipped quietly from the room. CHAPTER XII _Wherein Miss Betty Modeyne wins more Hearts_ It was a month or more before the boy was allowed to go into the country; so that it was early summer by the time they sent him away with Netherby--the small Betty being added to mother the party at the last moment, there having arisen doubts as to the quality of the housekeeping owing to the absent-mindedness of the bear-leader. So for a fortnight there was a happy party at the old inn by Burford Bridge. Where the Major slept during the fourteen nights was never known; but city wags to this day aver that it was beside the wine-cooler under the sideboard at _The Cock and Bull_ in Fleet Street. There are discrepancies, but the weight of evidence lies near the wine-cooler.... The fresh air of the Surrey uplands soon had the lad Oliver strung to the full pitch of devilment that is nature’s questionable gift to boyhood; and he rapidly regained what Netherby Gomme, with meaning accent, called his “habitual rude health.”...