However, even he grew tired of wise talk, and proposed a game with the fallen apples.  How we pelted each other, how we laughed, and, oh, how hot we did get at last!  Then off came hats and jackets, and were left behind under the trees while we went to rest ourselves in a piece of open shade, thrown by that large barn where, by and by, the apples would be stored away; and this was the moment which I seized to get his advice as to a new toy I had lately bought to send to Bobbie.  It was one of those wooden soldiers whose arms and legs are to go by means of a string; but the string, you know, is always getting hitched.  This was the case now, and it tasked all Alick’s wonderful brains to set it right.  How my back and arm did ache as I held it up for him, lying flat on the grass, to twitch, and pull, and contrive, and, at last, to conquer!  That happy moment had just come when there was a sound of wheels in the road near us.  One minute more, and Uncle Hugh’s voice was heard calling us, and the carriage stopped to take us up.  What grand, glorious news we were told as we drove home, two hatless, jacketless, sun-burnt children, I must not tell you this time.

VIII.

THE COTTAGE ON THE CLIFF.

“Well, my dearie,” said grandmamma, “uncle and I have just taken such a pretty little cottage for you all, high up on the cliff, looking right over the blue sea.  And you are to go off and try if the fresh wind up there will put a little more colour into those cheeks of yours!”

My dear little friends, I had just nestled down snugly enough on grandmamma’s silk dress and black lace shawl, never having the least idea of the dear, kind purpose of that long sixteen miles’ drive, so you won’t be surprised to hear that the news gave me such a start that I very nearly jumped out of the carriage.  And Alick—­well, I don’t know whether he was really half a boy or three quarters, but his shout certainly made you fancy him quite a whole boy at that minute!

Oh, the bright, bright pictures that came tumbling one over another in one’s mind, at the idea of the cottage on the cliff, crabs and shrimps and shells and sea-weed, and merry, merry waves in one happy muddle!  And do you know, nothing could induce the horses to trot fast enough up the long drive; they never seemed to consider one bit how much we had to tell, nor, indeed, how much we had to do, in preparation for to-morrow.  What if they had done a good thirty miles since breakfast, they could stay at home next day and eat hay from morning to night and leave it to Fairy and Whitefoot to do the hot work for us.

I really cannot tell you how much sleep we got that night.  I have a distinct remembrance of kicking all the bed-clothes off ever so many times, and of calling out to Lottie in the next room, without the smallest respect to rules.  And there was Jane as busy as could be, with Susette, packing up little frocks, and pinafores, and nightgowns.  Every now and then she would stop to say, “Really, Miss Sissy, you must be quiet, and go to sleep!” But, you know, that was just one of those remarks which it is of no use listening to.