"I must share in their fun," she said. "Don't look so troubled, Brenda. I must try and come to an understanding with them as soon as possible. Is this a pet beastie?"
"Yes, his name is Joshua, but they have been forbidden to bring him into the house. I'll take him back to his shed where he sleeps."
Anstice went back to her room. She did not anticipate an easy time, and yet longed to make acquaintance with these young rebels. It was rather a forlorn beginning of her new life, and she was at her window still wrapt in meditation when she heard Justin come up to his room next hers, and move about. Then she crept quietly into bed and fell asleep, not to wake till the sun was shining in a clear blue sky, and the birds singing in the garden beneath her window.
[CHAPTER III]
MAKING FRIENDS
BEFORE she dressed, Anstice went again to her window, and this time she could not help giving a cry of delight.
Such an exquisite view was before her. First a sloping green park with magnificent old spreading trees grouped here and there, under which cattle were browsing, then the blue lake like a sheet of glass lying between the purple Fells, which ranged themselves around it, in various heights and shapes, and with beautiful shadows passing to and fro. Directly underneath her window was a wide terrace walk; then, on a lower level, a well-kept lawn, on one side of which was a long herbaceous border already bright with flowers. At the bottom of the lawn was an old wall covered with fruit trees and flowering shrubs and creepers, and a gate in the middle of it which led into the park.
An hour later she left her room; for a big bell was ringing, and that was a summons to breakfast.
She had heard childish voices about the house, and once, from her window, had a flying glimpse of two short-frocked, long-legged girls, chasing each other across the lawn.
As she was crossing the corridor outside her room to go downstairs, she passed a room which had the door open, and heard her husband's voice: he evidently had caught sight of her, and called her in.