"Me? Teach you?"
"Of course. Why not? There's a cove in the island where they all swim."
Bertie looked off on the billows. "Would my mother like that?" he asked.
"I'm sure she would, and she would like the collection of stones we are going to make, and she would like you to help Miss Burridge by weeding the garden that they have started. There are so many delightful things to do in the world, and you are going to do them all—for her."
"All for her," echoed Bertie. "And not tell Uncle Nick," he added.
"No. You and I will keep the secret."
Mrs. Lowell looked at him with a smile, and the neglected boy, his dull wits stimulated by this amazing experience of comradeship, smiled back at her, the smile of the little child who in that far-away happy Christmas had received a sled.