‘No--but--Mysie--I can’t bear it!’ ‘I don’t want to call mamma,’ said Mysie, thoughtfully, ‘for she is so much tired, and Uncle Regie and Gill said she would be quite knocked up, and got her to come up to bed when we went. Dolly, would it be better if I got into your bed and cuddled you up?’ ‘Oh yes! oh yes! please do, there’s a dear good Mysie.’ There was not much room, but that mattered the less, and the hugging of the warm arms seemed to heal the terrible sense of being unloved and forsaken, the presence to drive away the visions of angry faces that had haunted her; but there was the longing for fellow-feeling on her, and she said, ‘That’s nice! Oh, Mysie! you can’t think what it is like! Uncle Regie said I didn’t care, and he could never forgive deliberate deceit--and I was so fond of Uncle Regie!’ ‘Oh! but he will, if you never tell a story again,’ said Mysie--and, as she felt a gesture implying despair--‘Yes, they do; I told a story once.’ ‘You, Mysie! I thought you never did?’ ‘Yes, once, when we were crossing to Ireland and nurse wouldn’t let Wilfred tie our handkerchiefs together and fish over the side, and he was very angry, and threw her parasol into the sea when she wasn’t looking; and I knew she would be so cross, that when she asked me if I knew what was become of it, I said ‘No,’ and thought I didn’t, really. But then it came over me, again and again, that I had told a story, and, oh! I was so miserable whenever I thought of it--at church, and saying my prayers, you know; and mamma was poorly, and couldn’t come to us at night for ever so long, but at last I could bear it no longer, I heard her say, ‘Mysie is always truthful,’ and then I did get it out, and told her. And, oh! she and papa were so kind, and they did quite and entirely forgive me!’ ‘Yes, you told of your own accord; and they were your own--not Uncle Regie. Ah! Mysie, everybody hates me. I saw them all looking at me.’ ‘No, no! Don’t say such things. Dolly. None of us do anything so shocking.’ ‘Yes, Jasper does, and Wilfred and Val!’ ‘No! no! no! they don’t hate; only they are tiresome sometimes; but if you wouldn’t be cross they would be nice directly--at least Japs and Val. And ‘tisn’t hating with Willie, only he thinks teasing is fun.’ ‘And you and Gillian. You can only just bear me. ‘No! no! no!’ with a great hug, ‘that’s not true.’ ‘You like Fly ever so much better!’ ‘She is so dear, and so funny,’ said Mysie, the truthful, ‘but somehow, Dolly dear, do you know, I think if you and I got to love one another like real friends, it would be nicer still than even Fly--because you are here like one of us, you know; and besides, it would be more, because you are harder to get at. Will you be my own friend. Dolly?’ ‘Oh, Mysie, I must!’ and there was a fresh kissing and hugging. ‘And there’s mamma,’ added Mysie.