"I wish you were coming too, Phil," she said wistfully.
"Nonsense," he replied, forcing himself to speak lightly. "You'll have plenty of company without me, I'll be bound. I dare say Miss Crawford will stay with you a good part of the time. O! Millie," he added, as a sudden recollection struck him, "Bournemouth is such a pretty place. One of the men in the shop used to live there, and he says it's perfectly lovely. Write and tell me all about it, won't you?"
She could only nod a reply, for they had arrived at the station, and there was Miss Crawford waiting on the platform.
"Good children to be punctual," she said. "I expect the others every minute. One of them is a little cripple, so his mother will bring him in a cab. Dr. Bethune promised to see the other two safely here. Now, Phil," she continued, "don't you think it will be wiser for you not to wait? I will take good care of Millie, I assure you."
"Yes, perhaps it would. The parting must come. It would do no good to linger over it."
Something called away Miss Crawford's attention, or she made believe it did, while Millie and Phil said good-bye to each other. Phil had no idea it would be such hard work to give his sister that last kiss. They had never been separated for a single day before, and now that Millie was starting in real earnest, he almost wished that he had never persuaded her to leave him, even for so short a time as a fortnight. However, he would not let her see how much he felt it. He gave her a last loving look, a hurried kiss, and was gone.
He could not return the same way by which he and Millie had come together. He chose another road that would take him back to Oxford Street by a less familiar route than up Drury Lane. It seemed to Phil that, with the loss of his sister, his guardian angel had left him. With a sinking heart he thought of the lonely evenings that would now be his, and of the long hours of weary waiting for his uncle's return at night. How difficult it would be to "keep the peace" after all! Poor Phil! With Millie gone, he felt that he had no good influence at work to aid him in resisting the temptation to indulge in sullenness and discontent. He was helpless indeed, for he knew not how to obtain that strength which "is made perfect in weakness."
