"’For that eye is so modestly beaming You ne’er think of mischief she’s dreaming—’" Grim and portentous came an interruption. "Is it mischievous?" "Er—" said Denis, and his eye twinkled, "she was when she was a puppy, you see." "Um," observed Miss Kezia. "If it works any mischief here, it will have to be chained up in the garden." "Sure, then," burst wildly from the Atom, "’tis myself’ll be chained beside her!" "Sheila, do not be absurd!" "And she isn’t ’it’! If you call her ’it’ again, I’ll be callin’ you a Scotch bannock!" Nell roused to a perfunctory— "Oh, Sheila Pat!" Miss Kezia said coldly, "You are a very rude little girl." She turned to Denis. "Will you tell me where that dog is to sleep?" "On the mat outside Nell’s door." "I will not have a dog rampaging over my house to work what mischief it likes while we sleep." "She shall sleep on my bed," put in a very disdainful Atom. "Certainly she shall not! Disgusting! Unhealthy! Spoiling my counterpanes!" Nell looked at Miss Kezia, a weary wonder in her face. "She can sleep on the floor beside my bed," she said. Miss Kezia hesitated; her eyes met those of the Atom—wide, defiant, indomitable in her small, obstinate face. In her ears echoed some words of Mrs. O’Brien’s that Miss Kezia had privately labelled foolish. "Sheila Pat is delicate. Perhaps we have spoilt her a little. She is very strong-willed. She cannot be driven, but she can be led. Her feelings use her up—exhaust her." There had been a little sudden hopeless pause there; then—"I hope you will understand her." Miss Kezia had not noticed the pause or the pleading note—a note vibrating with the struggle against the speaker’s own conviction. She would not have understood, had she noticed, any more than she would ever understand the Atom of humanity who was defying her now. "Very well," she said, with a glance of dislike at poor K.K. Denis broke in with a solicitous air, and a tone reminiscent of the Blarney Stone:— "I do wish you would go to bed, Aunt Kezia! You do look so tired." Nell smiled suddenly. "Yes, do, Aunt Kezia," she urged demurely. Miss Kezia, after somewhat lengthy directions as to turning off the gas, shutting, locking, and hanging a huge burglar bell on the dining-room door, turned to leave the room. Sheila Pat, stiff, erect, followed her with warlike gaze. Miss Kezia paused and said:— "See that that baby goes to bed the minute she has finished her porridge. She ought not to have gone to the docks at all—" Nell flashed out a shaky interruption— "Others—thought she ought!" The Atom observed calmly:— "I am not a baby. At home, gerrels of six will not be babies. I’m not wantin’ the stirabout at all, thank you." "Sheila, you are speaking with an atrocious accent!" For the first time that night the Atom’s sombre eyes lit with a gleam of satisfaction. "Accent, is it? Sure and ’tisn’t me own native accent I’d be ashamed of then!" she retorted.