In a few minutes he heard his sister’s step in the hall, and then a sob.  He had scarcely time to turn, when Miriam ran out, and threw herself down on the wide seat beside him.  Her face, as he could see it in the dim light, was one of despair, and as sob after sob broke from her, tears ran down her cheeks.  Tenderly he put his arm around her and urged her to tell him what had happened.

“Oh, Ralph,” she sobbed, “it is very hard, but I know it is true.  I have been just filled with vanity and pride, and after all I am nothing like as good as she is, nor as good as anybody, and the best I can do is to go back to school.”

“What is the matter?” exclaimed Ralph.  “You poor little thing, how came you to be so troubled?”

Miriam gave a long sigh and dropped her head on her brother’s shoulder.

“Oh, Ralph,” she said, “they are six inches high.”

“What are?” cried Ralph, in great amazement.

“The tarts,” she said; “the raspberry tarts I was making for you, because you like them, and because Dora Bannister was going to make them for you, and I determined that I could do it just as well as she could, and that I would do it and that you would not have to miss her for anything.  But it is of no use; I cannot do things as well as she can, and those tarts are not like tarts at all; they are like chimneys.”

“I expect they are very good indeed.  Now do not drop another tear, and let us go in and eat them.”

“No,” said Miriam, “they are not good.  I know what is the matter with them.  I have found out that I have no more idea of making pie crust than I have about the nebulous part of astronomy, and that I never could comprehend.  I wanted to make the lightest, puffiest pastry that was possible, and I used some self-raising flour, the kind that has the yeast ground up with it, and when I put those tarts in the oven to bake, they just rose up, and rose up, until I thought they would reach up the chimney.  They are perfectly horrid.”

Ralph sprang to his feet, and lifted his sister from her seat.  “Come along, little one,” he cried, “and I shall judge for myself what sort of a pastry-cook you are.”

“The pigs shall judge that,” said Miriam, who had now dried her eyes, “but fortunately there are other things to eat.”

The tarts, indeed, were wonderful things to look at, resembling, as Miriam had said, a plateful of little chimneys, with a sort of swallow’s nest of jam at the top, but Ralph did not laugh at them.

“Wait until their turn comes,” said Ralph, “and I will give my opinion about them.”

When he had finished the substantial part of the meal, he drew the plate of tarts toward him.

“I will show you how to eat the Cobhurst tart.  You cut it down from top to bottom:  then you lay the two sections on their rounded sides:  then you get a lot more of jam, which I see you have on the side table, and you spread the cut surfaces with it:  then you put it together as it was before, and slice it along its shorter diameter.  Good?” said he; “they are delicious.”