"But what to do with her at home? The child mustn't grow up a savage. She can't go to the Sunday School."

"Oh! Dr Norman, there is plenty of time to think about that. A little holiday, more or less, won't do any harm; and, after all, what so important as health?"

"You are right, indeed; and it is very kind and very sensible of you to interest yourself on behalf of my poor little motherless girl."

And they continued this practical friendly talk all the way up hill and down hill, discussing Regy's shirts, Clevy's jackets, Wattie's pocket-money, &c. "What a shrewd, unaffected, capable young lady !" thought Dr Norman. "I am sure Laura could not have a better companion!"

Next day he set off for London. Kitty was up betimes, busying herself about the early breakfast and her host's comfort, filling his flask, rubbing up his opera-glass, sewing on his buttons.

"Shall I pack your portmanteau?" she had ventured to say; but he refused; he pretended to be very indignant about the buttons, too; but she laughed at his indignation in such a frank, pleasant way that he left off scolding, and was grateful instead. Then she poured out his tea quite naturally and calmly, and heard his last instructions about the children, and received his cheque for the children's expenses. One would have thought she was Dr Norman's sister-in-law by the friendly tone she took towards him. When the carriage came up, and all the household came out to say adieu, she took Prissy and Wattie by the hand, and ran with them down to the front gate to see papa off. Dr Norman looked back, nodding and waving his handkerchief quite gaily. Never since becoming a widower had he left home under such happy auspices. Even Prisg forbowe to ery, and he felt sure that, under Kitty's rule, all would go wel

CHAPTER VI.

KITTY EX CATHEDRA.

Of course all did go well, for Kitty had so determined, and Kitty had a will. Before Dr Norman went away she had said to herself, "I don't mind how much these children trouble and tire me. I don't mind how much Prissy's whims or Regy's jealousies perplex me. If I have to rise at five o'clock every morning to please Regy, to dress fifty dolls a day to please Prissy, I will do it. Laura shall sentimentalise all day and never find me unsympathetic; Clevy shall always find me ready to play draughts or cricket. I shall always have sweets in my pocket for Wattie, and will cut paper horses for him whenever it rains. I will gossip with old Symonds, and make her a grand satin pincushion. I will please all the other maids, and buy them new caps. There isn't a soul in the place I am going to neglect or dissatisfy; and by the time Dr Norman comes home, he shall have Kitty Silver, Kitty Silver, Kitty Silver, dinned in his ears from morning till night."

At first she did not lie on a bed of roses. Nothing is more difficult than to dance to everybody's fiddle, and Kitty had resolved upon dancing to everybody's fiddle. She found that this would cost no little time or tranquillity; but what were time and tranquillity to her in comparison with some other things? Flattery is the golden key that unlocks most minds, and Kitty knew how to handle that key very dexterously, never breaking or hampering a lock, never setting about the task noisily or too much on a sudden. By various devices and expediencies, she managed to make herself necessary to every-body, and-herein lay her crowning piece of cleverness-to make everybody appear equally necessary to her.

The Normans were good children, but they had one faultthey were jealous. They could not love Kitty as other boys and girls would have done, moderately and ready to make another idol on the morrow; but they must love her blindly, impetuously, each craving her love and friendship, each ready

so on.

to quarrel with the other about her most trifling deed or word. At first, it was always thus: "Oh! Kitty has given you that doll, has she? Then I shall throw my top away, for I'm sure the doll cost double;" or, "Kitty is going to walk to church with you, Master Clevy! That's an idea, indeed! If she doesn't walk with me, I shall stay at home;" or, "Kitty is my friend, and you must not always want her company ;" and But Kitty, who combined the wisdom of the serpent with the gentleness of the dove, soon found a remedy for this spirit of captiousness. First, she appealed to their vanity, and next she appealed to their pride. For instance, she would take Regy aside, and say to him: "Regy, you are old enough to be my friend; and if you do not help me whilst your father is away, I shall go away too. You are not a boy in years; why do you sometimes make me forget that you are so little younger than I? I should not have consented to stay unless I had looked upon your society as some little compensation for other things. I love the children, as you know; but I'm not a child myself, and they sometimes weary me and dishearten me, loving as they are." And such speeches as these, often accompanied by the glisten of a tear in her eyes, made Regy beside himself with penitence and enthusiasm. It was wonderful to see how much older and taller he seemed to grow in the course of a few weeks. He cared a great deal more for reading aloud to Miss Silver than cricketing with his friends, and grew bold enough to offer her bouquets, to button her gloves, to carry her parasol, to praise her bonnet. Everything Miss Silver did was well done, everything she wore was pretty, everything she said was clever, in Regy's estimation. And what wonder? Any woman who is gracious and handsome becomes a goddess to boys of eighteen,-and Kitty was very gracious and handsome, people said. Kitty managed Prissy on a wholly different principle. The child lived entirely in her affections, and learned to love very slowly. Kitty could not love her at once, but she determined to love her by rule and rote, and to win her love in return. It is by no means impossible to love by rule and rote, neither is it impossible to make that love appear

bright and good, as electro-plate imitates silver. And Kitty's imitations were always excellent. She compassed the child with sweet observances; she toiled for her from morning till night; she was ready to turn the house upside-down to please her. "O Prissy," she said, many and many a time, "I let all the others go in order to make you fond of me, and I am no more to you than I ever was! Prissy, you would love me if you knew how alone I am in the world. I have no papa, no sisters, no brothers, and yet Prissy won't love me."

It ended by Prissy loving her; and, after that conquest, Kitty's ways became ways of pleasantness, and her paths paths of peace. Shelley House was nicer than Paradise Place, Kitty thought, as she ruled supreme in it during these balmy days of late summer. She liked the spaciousness, the abundance, the slovenly, easy-going, inconsequent well-being of the place. It was a sort of Bohemia. Order or anything like routine were unknown. The common events of life never repeated themselves from day to day, as in other houses. Every meal was a surprise, either in the matter or manner of it. Every noteworthy occurrence, whether in the way of work or play, was a precedent. Sometimes a big gong would sound at eight o'clock in the morning, and all the household, like a troop of rabbits scuttling to feed, would rush into the breakfast-room to hear Dr Norman read prayers. One Sunday he would carry the children to church, on another to chapel, on a third to the Quakers' meeting-house. Once or twice a host of plasterers and masons had appeared at Shelley House. "Papa says I may have the place done up, if I choose to see to it," Regy had said, explanatorily; but he had not seen to it, and the plasterers and masons appeared no more. One day the children woke up, determined to be industrious, and from morning till night Regy and Clevy shut themselves up in their carpenter's shop, and the girls sat sewing over a basket of clothes for the poor. Another day Regy chose to dig a canal in the kitchen-garden, and a pretty mess he made of it. No place was sacred except Dr Norman's study, and the

corridor leading to it, which was closed by a baize door. Not even Prissy presumed to open that door without leave. "Was it always so?" Kitty once asked of old Symonds the. housekeeper; "in Mrs Norman's time, I mean?"

The old woman lifted up her hands deprecatingly.

"My dear Miss, Mrs Norman was just like the children, as full of spirits as an egg is full of meat; and, like them, handsome too, but she hadn't as much order in her whole body as you have in your little finger. The house looked better then, because she kept more servants, and the furniture was new; but, Lord bless your heart! neither she nor master cared to see anything spick and span. Not they. Mistress was very fond of music, and master was always wrapped up in his books, as he is now, only that mistress was a good deal with him. The house might go, and the house did go, and it's done nothing but go ever since. I should like to rise from my grave and see the place in apple-pie order when Master Regy comes to it. Not that I wish anything to happen to master; I'm sure I feel like a mother to him; only you know, Miss, one don't expect to use brushes and brooms in heaven, and it's a shame, as I think, not to be tidy whilst here below; but there's no making master of women's way of thinking, none whatsomever."

Kitty saw no necessity for making Dr Norman tidy, though she had feigned a little tidiness herself, by way of pleasing the maids; she therefore tried to introduce no new element into the household, rather fostering the old, only taking great care that the disorder should be bright and pleasant and comfortable. She coaxed Symonds into dismissing one or two inefficient servants, and hiring more capable ones. She coaxed the gardener into putting the garden into order. She coaxed everybody into the persuasion that she herself was the fittest person to order the dinner. As time wore on, and Dr Norman's return might be expected in a week or two, Kitty reviewed her campaign triumphantly. The children were all supplied with new-fashioned, well-made clothes; the cook scavenged the poultry-yard and the vegetable-garden, and sent up