“If his name is Archie,” I said, “I am his sister.”

“I’ve met him,” and she blushed.

This, then, was the girl Archie longed to save from drowning, and who inspired him with a desire to sing hymns on Sunday evenings.  Dear old Archie!  I could imagine his tender, susceptible heart going out to the little widow.  But I said to myself, “It’s no good, Archie dear, not yet at all events, not while she looks as she does over the sea,” for I was sure it was far away in a grave on the lonely veldt that her heart was buried.

“He is so devoted to children, isn’t he?” she said.  “He was so good to my baby.  I find that men are so extraordinarily fond of children.  I am afraid they will spoil him.”

Whereupon the baby burst into a long dissertation on a present he had lately received.  It sounded something like this:  —­

“Mormousman give boy a yockerile an a epelan, anye yockerile yanan yan all over de jurnmer yunder de hoha an eberelyyare.”

He then proceeded to turn bead over heels, or try to, and was sharply rebuked by Sara, who rearranged his garments with stern severity, and then was about to show him the right method, when she in turn was stopped by Nannie.

One of the twins arrived at this moment to say that Hugh had called him bad names.  Betty the peacemaker explained that Hugh had called him a wicket keeper, and the twin had thought he bad called him a wicked keeper.  So that was all right.  We suggested that, in any case, the twin wasn’t the best person to be wicket keeper.  But he went in twice running to make up, and Hugh gave him several puddings as well.  “Puddings,” the nursery-maid explained, were first balls, and didn’t count.

“Betty,” I said, “you’ve got a hole in your stocking!”

“I hope it ’s not a Jacob’s ladder,” said Betty.

“Hush, darling, hush,” said Hugh; “you know we mustn’t be irreverent!”

It was during an interval when we rested and drank milk and ate cake, those of us who would or could, that we discovered that the little widow was staying with a very old friend of my father’s and mother’s.

“And where does Lady Mary live?” asked Diana.

“Just over there.  Do come and see her; she will be so delighted to see you and to show you the garden, which is quite famous.”

Chapter XVI

The following day Diana got a delightful letter from Lady Mary asking us to go to luncheon, or to tea, or to both, or whatever we liked best, so long as it was at once, and that we stayed a long time, and brought all the children.  She offered to send for us, but going in a donkey-cart was a stipulation on the part of the children, otherwise they could not or would not tear themselves away from the sand and all its fascinations.  Sara was particularly offended at having to get out to tea, and more so at not being allowed to go in her bathing-drawers.