“I wonder who will do the music and dancing!”

The next morning, the instant her breakfast was over, Milly obtained nurse’s permission to go down to the keeper’s cottage under charge of Sarah, the nursery maid.  She was away the whole morning, and about one o’clock a message came from Mrs. Maxwell to ask if she might stay to dinner with them.  So that it was not till nearly four in the afternoon that she was brought up to the house, and then, flushed and excited, she poured into her nurse’s ear a long account of all that she had been hearing and doing.

“Now, come, my dear, you mustn’t talk forever,” was nurse’s remonstrance at last; “Sir Edward told me I could send you to him for a little when you came in, and I must make you tidy first.”

It was quite dusk when Milly entered the library, but the bright firelight showed her the figure of her uncle leaning back in his easy chair, and indulging in a reverie.

“Well,” he said, looking round, “where have you been all day?  Down at Maxwell’s, I suppose?”

“Yes,” said Milly, sedately; “and I’ll tell you all about it, if you like.  May I make myself comfortable first?”

And after a minute’s hesitation she climbed into the heavy armchair on the opposite side of the fireplace, making a pretty picture, as she leaned her curly head back on the cushion and gazed earnestly into her uncle’s face.

“We will have a crack together, uncle.  That’s what Maxwell calls it, when Mrs. Maxwell and I talk over the fire.  May I tell you all about Tommy now?”

“You may,” was the amused reply.

“Well, you know, I ran as fast as I could down to the wood this morning, and Sarah ran after me, and Mrs. Maxwell saw me coming and she ran to the door.  I was rather out of breath, you see, so she just smoothed me down a little, and we kissed each other, and she cried a tiny bit, for I felt her tears on my face.  Then she took me in to see Tommy—­Maxwell was out, and Tommy was in the kitchen in one of Maxwell’s great-coats, and he was eating some bacon at the table for his breakfast.  He got up when he saw me—­he’s a nice big man, uncle, but I think his hair wants cutting.  We shook hands, and I told him I’d been expecting him ever so long.  He looked rather shy, but after he had quite finished his breakfast, we had a very nice talk, and Mrs. Maxwell went bustling about getting dinner ready.  Tommy told me all about himself from the very beginning, but I really quite forget some of it.  He never kept any pigs at all, but he kept some sheep instead—­he went out to America and did it—­and then he was a railway man, and then he had a fever, and then he got into bad company, and at last he came to London, and he was an omnibus man there, and then a cabman, and then he drank too much beer, and his money all went away, and he was ashamed of himself, and so he wouldn’t write home, and then he smashed his cab against the lamp-post, and then he drank too much again.”