But the devil had gone out of the lad, it seemed, when he scaled the wall of Langton Hall and greeted the little Brown Fairy who waited there for him.
There was no one to love Gawky Mike, with his impish pranks, at Berrington Manor; and so dewy kisses from sweet, childish lips were the more cherished, and the very thought of them stirred unknown depths in the boy's soul.
And Gabrielle—little coquette—knew her power. The sauciness of the pretty baby! What a tyrant she was, refusing him any grace till he had done her will—sometimes treating him with disdain, at others with a friendliness which was enchanting; Michael, great booby, taking it all in deadliest earnest.
Then, one day, her lips pouted in earnest. "Morice is coming to-day," she confided to her loyal knight. "Bah! I am not glad, although Nursie says it is wicked, seeing that he is my only brother. But then he should not pull my hair and call me Mistress Mouse. I do not like it; and he is very rough. He is not like you, Michael."
And Michael, rough, dare-devil Michael, smiled triumphantly into approving brown eyes. He had ever been gentle knight on this side of the old wall.
The next day found Gabrielle in tears, nursing a black bruise on a dimpled arm.
It is true the tears had been squeezed into evidence as soon as she heard a certain voice humming a merry tune in the road yonder.
But sympathy is welcome balm in trouble. The Brown Fairy told a harrowing tale of how Morry had caught her arm because she stole his peach at breakfast.
Michael vowed vengeance hot and strong.
The opportunity came sooner than they expected, for, at this moment, who should come down the path but Morry himself! A fine young cockerel, this, of nearly seventeen summers, attired according to the latest mode, and flicking, with a little ebony cane, at the heads of yellow marigolds. 'Twas a flaunting flower he should have cherished.