The policeman did not reply immediately; he folded up his notebook, but the woman who had gasped came to him with a yearning cry and wrapped him in her protesting arms with a thousand kisses.
"Ye poor lamb, ye poor little orphan, whatever 'ull become of ye!"
At that moment the bell of the Orphanage burst into a peal of harsh impetuous clangour and the policemen picked up their helmets from the bed.
CRAVEN ARMS
All schools since the beginning of time have been modern at some period of their existence, but this one was modern, so the vicar declared, because it was so blessedly hygienic; the townspeople were perhaps proudest of its evening classes, very advanced they were—languages, sciences, arts—and very popular. The school was built upon a high tree-arboured slope overlooking the snug small town and on its western side stared ambiguously at a free upland country that was neither small nor snug. The seventeen young women and the nine young men who comprised the evening sketching class were definitely, indeed articulately, inartistic; they were as unæsthetic as pork pies, all except Julia Tern, a golden-haired pure-complexioned fawn of a girl whose talent was already beyond the reach of any instruction the teacher could give. He could not understand why she continued to attend his classes.
One evening she brought for his criticism a portrait sketch of himself.
"This is extraordinarily beautiful," he murmured.
"Yes," said Julia.