"I didn't know you was here, missie; it was very cunning of you to feign sleep like that--it was very cunning and over sharp, but it don't come round me. No, no; you has got to speak up now, and say what you has seen, and what you hasn't seen. I allow of no nonsense with little girls, and I can always see through them when they mean to tell a lie. You know where the children who tell lies go to, so you'd better speak up, and the whole truth, missie." Dove spoke in a very rough voice, and poor Daisy felt terribly frightened. "I didn't see anything," she began, in her innocent way. "I was fast, fast asleep. I thought you were Jasmine--Jasmine should have been back long ago. I have a bad cold, and I was trying to pass the time by going to sleep. I haven't seen anything, Mr. Dove." "Let me look into your eyes, miss," said Dove; "open them wide, and let me look well into them." "Oh! you frighten me, Mr. Dove," said Daisy, beginning to cry. "I was very lonely, and I'd have liked you to come up half an hour ago; but you look so queer now, and you speak in such a rough voiced--what is the matter? Perhaps you were bringing up some of those books for Jasmine. Oh! I don't know why you should speak to me like that." Dove's brow cleared; he began to believe that the child had really been asleep, and had not seen the peculiar manner in which he had been employing himself for the last ten minutes. "Look here, miss," he said, "I don't mean to be rough to you, you pretty little lady. Look here, what I was after was all kindness. I only spoke rough as a bit of a joke. I has got some lollipops in my pocket for a nice little maid; I wonder now who these yere lollipops are for?" "For me, perhaps?" said Daisy, who, although she could not have swallowed a sweety to save her life at that moment, had sense enough to know that her wisest plan was to propitiate Dove. "You're fond of lollipops then, missie? you didn't think as 'twas because poor Dove guessed that, that he travelled up all these weary stairs? Kind of him, wasn't it? but you're real fond of lollipops, ain't you, missy?" "Some kinds," answered Daisy, who was really a most fastidious child, and who shrank from the sticky-looking sweetmeats proffered to her by Dove. "I like the very best chocolate creams; Primrose brings them to me sometimes, but they are rather expensive. Oh! and I like sticky sweets too," she continued seeing an ominous frown gathering on Dove's brow. "I'm very much obliged to you, Mr. Dove." Then making a great effort, she put out her little white hand to take one of the sweeties. But Dove drew back quickly. "No, no," he said, "not till they're arned--by no means until they're arned. You don't suppose as a poor man--a poor man with a large family, and an only love of a wife--can afford to bring sweeties all for nothing to rich little ladies like yourself. No, no, miss; you arn them, and you shall have them."