And, to dear grandmamma, I think it was a very anxious time that followed.  My little head could not take in all it meant when news came of danger, then of baby’s illness, then of nurse’s.  I could see that other people were sorry; once I found Jane crying, and was caught up on to her lap and kissed and talked to, till a clear memory of the dear, chubby little brother at home came back to me, and I had a long, miserable fit of sobbing.  But, you see, I had been away from them all for nearly six months, and the little brothers and sisters around me had somehow shut out the two little fellows at home, and my play and lessons at Beecham seemed much more real than the sorrow all those miles away.  In a few weeks all the worst time was over, but, of course, there was no idea now of my going home.

I wonder if grandmamma ever thought, in the early spring, that for a whole year she was to have her house full of children!  For a long time we fancied every week that we should hear of aunt and uncle coming home.  Every now and then Lottie and I would fret a little bit at the idea of parting, but still it did not come.

One morning brought a letter for Lottie, with a great deal of news in it.  She read it to me in the nursery, as we were having our hair brushed for the evening in the drawing-room.  It told us that her papa had just made up his mind to take the work of a clergyman in a more out-of-the-way part, somewhere between Switzerland and Germany, and that it was just the place to suit her mamma, so they would probably stay there till Christmas.  Besides, there were some little German cousins of Lottie’s living close by with their aunt, so there was a great deal to tell altogether.  We were very eager talking about little Heinrich and Carl—­so eager that at first we never noticed that Susette had thrown herself into a chair with clasped hands, and her black eyes full of tears.  When we came to question her, she said Monsieur and Madame had gone to a place close to her native village, and would they—­oh, would they—­see her poor, poor father, in the misery extreme, frightful!  We were quite used to Susette now, and not at all surprised at her passionate manner; and if we did a little smile to each other at that favourite word “affreuse,” yet Lottie was eager and sincere enough in her assurances that certainly papa would go and look for the poor family.  Out came the foreign paper at once, and if the summons to the dining-room had not come at that moment, I believe the letter would have been written there and then.  As it was, it certainly went the next day.  It was our first piece of anything like charity, and we waited eagerly for the answer from Lottie’s papa, which, of course, did not arrive directly it was wanted.

At last the morning came, when the postman, met by three eager children half-way down the drive, was greeted by the happy cry, “Oh, there it is!  I see it in his hand!” And the much-longed-for prize was snatched from him, and triumphantly carried off to the nursery.