“We have written about it, Mrs. Church,” said Miss O’Flynn.  “I wrote to my brother-in-law this very day, and I expect an answer soon.  Of course, we can’t tell you to a certainty whether the house is still to be had, but I didn’t hear that it was let.  We must hope for the best.”

“And if it is let,” said Kathleen suddenly, running up to the old lady and whispering in her ear, “I’ll get Dad to send me a cheque, and you shall have it, so you won’t lose one way or the other.”

This whisper of Kathleen’s was very soothing to Mrs. Church.  She nodded her head twice and said: 

“Thank you, dear,” and just then Susy returned, and tea began in real earnest.

While the ladies were enjoying their meal they did not observe that a round boyish face occasionally appeared at the little glass partition which divided Mrs. Church’s sitting-room from her bedroom.  The glass reached down about two feet from the ceiling, and was the only light the bedroom had.  The boyish face bobbed up now and again, made appealing faces in Mrs. Church’s direction, and then disappeared.  Mrs. Church shook her head at the apparition, but for a time no one noticed the circumstance.  Then Susy began to observe it.

“What can it mean?” she thought, and she turned and looked.

The face appeared, the tongue now stuck into the cheek, one eye winking furiously.

“Well, I never!” said Susy.

“What are you saying, ‘Well, I never!’ for?” asked Kathleen.  “And why do you and Mrs. Church keep gazing up at that ugly glass across the room?  What is the glass for?”

“It is the window that lights my bedroom, miss,” said Mrs. Church.  “And I don’t see,” she added, “why I may not look at any part of my own house that I take a fancy to.”

“Of course,” said Kathleen.  But Tom was now making pantomimic signs for refreshments.  He was touching his mouth, which he opened into a round O, pointing at the cake and honey, and going on altogether in a way that distracted poor Susy.  And just as Susy looked up Kathleen looked up, and the latter burst into a loud laugh, and said: 

“I do declare there’s a boy in there.”

The next instant she had burst into the bedroom and dragged Tom out.

“Oh, you are Tom Hopkins,” she said; “you are Susy’s brother.  Now sit down here and have a right good meal.  It was silly of you to hide in there; as if we minded.”

“But Kathleen, you ought to mind,” said Susy; “for it would be the very last straw if we were discovered and there is a boy found amongst us.  I declare I never felt so nervous in my life.—­Do go back to the bedroom, Tom.—­Aunt Church, oughtn’t he to go?”

“Come and sit by me,” said Mrs. Church.  “And here’s a fresh egg for you.  Take your place, Tom; and when the others go into the yard for their foolish mummeries—­for I can’t make out that there’s a bit of sense in this scheme from first to last—­why, you and I will finish up what is left of the good things.”