Five minutes passed and he had not returned. Granny became impatient. Poor Granny! who grudged losing even a minute of her darling's presence when she knew that she was about to lose it for so long.
"My dear," she said to me, "will you kindly go and see if he is ready? The dog-cart will so soon be round."
Hastening upstairs, I went to the nursery to bring down the little beggar to rejoice her sight for the short period that remained before he left.
As I approached the open door I heard Briggs taking leave of him, and with more sentiment than was generally to be observed in the utterances of that dignified person.
"And you won't forget your Briggs?" she said, kissing him; "and you'll send her a letter sometimes?"
"A long, long letter; ever so long," promised Chris rashly. "And you've wroten down the place what you live at?"
"Yes, here it is," said Briggs, holding out an envelope and reading aloud as I entered:
"Miss Amelia Briggs,
6 Balaclava Villas,
Upper Touting,
London."
"And you'll write me a nice letter, won't you, Master Chris?"
"Nicer than ever you can think," he replied, as she kissed him again with something like emotion, and bade him good-bye.