But Kitty with a look and a sign checked him.  “Wait,” she whispered.  “I think you had better wait, or you may make things worse for Anna.”

Dan looked distressed.  “I don’t think I shall,” he answered testily, as Aunt Pike went out of the room.  “I hate mystery.  Why can’t we speak out and have it over?  I am going to, Kitty.”

“I want you to, as much as you do,” she answered in a troubled voice, “but we have to think of Anna.  She did so much for us last night, and—­ well, I believe if we were to tell Aunt Pike all about it now, it would hurt her more than ever, because she would think Anna had been deceiving her; and Anna did not mean to, she only meant to be kind to us.”

So Dan, though most unwillingly, had to agree.  It annoyed him, and hurt his dignity, and offended his sense of honour to have to let Anna bear the weight of his misdoing; but he still hoped that when he could see Anna she might consent to his making a full confession.  Here, though, he was again doomed to disappointment, for Anna only turned to him pleadingly.  “Don’t say anything about it,” she cried.  “O Dan, don’t!  If mother was to know now she would be more angry than ever, and she would never trust me again, or forgive either of us.”

So Dan, out of his gratitude to her, had to give in; and there the matter rested for the time at least.  But it had brought about two important changes—­it cured Dan, and all of them, for some time, of their love of reading in bed; and it made them more tolerant in their feelings towards Anna.

Christmas, since that last one their mother had spent with them, had never been a festive or a happy season in Dr. Trenire’s house.  To the doctor it was too full of sad memories for him to be able to make it gay or cheerful for his children, and the children did not know how to set about making it so for themselves, while Aunt Pike had no ideas on the subject beyond sending and receiving a few cards, giving Anna a half-sovereign to put in the savings bank, and ordering a rather more elaborate dinner on Christmas Day.

Kitty, Dan, and Betty this year felt a real yearning for a Christmas such as they had read of, and discussed all manner of impossible plans, but there it all ended.  Dr. Trenire gave them a book each, and they sat around the schoolroom fire reading them and munching the sweets they had clubbed together to buy, and that was all the festivity they had that year.

It was a damp, mild season, unseasonable and depressing, pleasant neither for going out nor for staying indoors; and Dan, who had less than five weeks’ holidays, and had already had one of them spoilt by the weather, grumbled loudly, fully convinced that he had every reason to do so.