"Nor a permanency?" Louie asked. "What, with those clothes? I ask you, now: it isn't a cold night to-night, is it? Well, why does he keep that heavy old coat on all the evening? Enough said, my dear. He works somewhere in the City, I believe--'something in the City'--sounds most prosperous, doesn't it? And Archie's awful kind to him, I think, but of course he is frightfully clever, and does help Archie with his work sometimes, so Archie gives him a bath (I don't mean what you mean, I mean lets him have one). Here's Evie. Are you coming along?" But Louie, besides being tickled, smarted a little too. To have to beg for a bath--and then to have the gift made a matter of common knowledge and a joke!-- Well, if these people were different, differences, after all, were what she was here to see. She turned to Mr. Weston. What Mr. Weston wanted to say to her she could not guess; but he had hardly spoken twenty words before she was smiling at herself for not guessing. The examinations were to be held just before Christmas, and unless Louie could be ready for her Elementary by that time she would have a good many months to wait before she could enter for the examination again. What Mr. Weston had to propose was, in a word, that he should coach her privately. She knew what that meant. It meant that he would come to Sutherland Place on Sundays and talk about Richenda. Well, even talk about Richenda would make shorter that _dies non_. "It really would be a great furtherance of your aims, Miss Causton," Weston said wistfully. Louie smiled at the periphrasis, and then considered. "It might be the best thing to do," she said; "but of course I should accept it only on one condition." "May I venture to inquire what that condition is?" Weston inquired deferentially. "That you let me pay you for it," said Louie promptly. But Weston put up a peremptory hand. "Oh no--no, no, no--I should be ashamed after all your kindnesses----" Louie laughed again. "Good gracious, what kindnesses?" "Ah, you once shielded an individual very dear to me and took the blame upon yourself, Miss Causton----" His tone was reverential, his eyes did her homage. Louie had forgotten all about the box-room rebellion and Mrs. Lovenant-Smith. She laughed once more. "Well, just as you like. But no pay, no coaching, that's all." Weston sighed. No doubt his acquiescence cost him a pang. If he took money for giving lessons, lessons he must give, and the talk about Richenda must go. "Do you dwell on the point with insistence?" he asked. "Very much." "I am far from denying that it would be of some assistance in the furnishing of our future nest, if I may use the expression----" "Of course it would. So that's agreed?" "So be it," said Weston. Louie half expected him to add: "Amen."