stirring."

"Oh, hurrah!" I answered. "This is Aunt Penelope's day. Are we all going, Anastasia? And when we go, shall I ask her at once if she is your aunt, too?"

"Now, for goodness' sake, stay still, Miss Heather, while I tie your things. You are such an awful fidget."

I was dressed in an incredibly short space of time, and I had eaten a good breakfast, and Anastasia had taken me by the hand and brought me downstairs. Daddy was waiting for me in the hall, and he looked very big and broad and important. He went up to Anastasia and said a few words to her, and I think he slipped something into her hand, but I am not sure. She turned abruptly and walked away, and I said:

"Where is she going, father?"

"Never mind."

Then we got into a cab, and I said:

"But where's Anastasia?"

"Oh, if she's quick we may meet her at the railway station," said father; "and if she is slow she must come on by the next train."

"Oh, dear, what a nuisance!" I answered. "I did want her to come with us."

"It all depends upon whether she is quick or slow," said father.

"Well, at any rate," I answered, with a child's easy acceptance of a situation which she cannot understand, "it is lovely to go to Aunt Penelope."

We reached the railway station. Anastasia was slow—she was nowhere to be seen. Father said, in his cheerful voice:

"All right, little woman, she'll catch the next train." And then we found ourselves facing each other in two padded compartments of a first-class carriage, and the train moved out of the station, and we were off. There happened to be no one else in the carriage, but Daddy was very silent, and almost pale, for him. Once he said, bending towards me and speaking abruptly:

"Promise me one thing?"

"Yes, Daddy," I answered.

"You will never think badly of me whatever you hear?"

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