'Yes, I was just thinking so,' mamma replied; 'but I shall wait till you have inquired about the iron room. She knows our troubles already,' she went on, turning to Geordie and me; 'she has known about them for some days, and she says whatever we do, or wherever we go, she will not leave us.'

'Oh, I am so glad!' exclaimed Geordie and I in a breath. 'We thought she would be like that,' I went on; 'and I should hope she'd like the hut far, far better than going away to some horrid little poky house among strangers. And, mamma, don't you think Margery would be the best for the other servant.'

'Are we to have two?' said mamma laughing. 'Your plans are getting quite grand, Ida!'

'Of course you must have two,' said papa, 'and one of the men to look after things outside. I have an idea about that; Geordie and I will talk about it together,' and he nodded to Geordie, who looked very pleased at being consulted in this way, as if he were quite big.

'When will you ask about the parish room?' he said to papa. 'May I go with you when you do? Perhaps I could help about the measuring.'

For they had already settled as to where it should be placed—at one side of the hut, but a little to the back, so that it should not spoil the rather pretty look we were gradually managing to give to the front, by training creepers over the porch, and filling two or three large square tubs with bushy, hardy plants which would stand the winter, and placing them at each side of the long low windows.

'Certainly,' said papa. 'We can drive down to Kirke immediately after breakfast to-morrow morning. And if it is all right about the room, I will see the man whom, I think, Mr. Lloyd employed to put it up. He will understand the best way of partitioning it off, and our own men can work under his directions.'

So it was in the best of spirits—considering, that is to say, the real sorrow of parting with dear papa, and the real anxiety that must hang over us for many months to come, at least—that we set off home again, Esmé chattering about how she had wiped all the tea-cups and saucers, and how Margery had said that she could not possibly have 'got through' without her.

'That is not a very elegant expression, my little girl,' said papa. 'Don't you think you could say it some other way.'