about it at home. These holidays, Hugh made a better listener than even his sisters; and he was a more amusing one—he knew so little about the country. He asked every question that could be imagined about the playground at the Crofton school, and the boys’ doings out of school; and then, when Philip fancied he must know all about what was done, out came some odd remark which showed what wrong notions he had formed of a country life. Hugh had not learned half that he wanted to know, and his little head was full of wonder and mysterious notions, when the holidays came to an end, and Philip had to go away. From that day Hugh was heard to talk less of Spain, and the sea, and desert islands, and more of the Crofton boys; and his play with little Harry was all of being at school. At his lessons, meantime, he did not improve at all.

One very warm day, at the end of August, five weeks after Philip had returned to school, Miss Harold had stayed full ten minutes after twelve o’clock to hear Hugh say one line of the multiplication-table over and over again, to cure him of saying that four times seven is fifty-six; but all in vain: and Mrs Proctor had pegged her not to spend any more time to-day upon it.

Miss Harold went away, the girls took their sewing, and sat down at their mother’s work-table, while Hugh was placed before her, with his hands behind his back, and desired to look his mother full in the face, to begin again with “four times one is four,” and go through the line, taking care what he was about. He did so; but before he came to four times seven, he sighed, fidgetted, looked up at the corners of the room, off into the work-basket, out into the street, and always, as if by a spell, finished with “four times seven is fifty-six.” Jane looked up amazed—Agnes looked down ashamed; his mother looked with severity in his face. He began the line a fourth time, when, at the third figure, he started as if he had been shot. It was only a knock at the door that he had heard; a treble knock, which startled nobody else, though, from the parlour-door being open, it sounded pretty loud.

Mrs Proctor spread a handkerchief over the stockings in her work-basket; Jane put back a stray curl which had fallen over her face; Agnes lifted up her head with a sigh, as if relieved that the multiplication-table must stop for this time; and Hugh gazed into the passage, through the open door, when he heard a man’s step there. The maid announced Mr Tooke, of Crofton; and Mr Tooke walked in.

Mrs Proctor had actually to push Hugh to one side,—so directly did he stand in the way between her and her visitor. He stood, with his hands still behind his back, gazing up at Mr Tooke, with his face hotter than the multiplication-table had ever made it, and his eyes staring quite as earnestly as they had ever done to find Robinson Crusoe’s island in the map.

“Go, child,” said Mrs Proctor: but this was not enough. Mr Tooke himself had to pass him under his left arm before he could shake hands with Mrs Proctor. Hugh was now covered with shame at this hint that he was in the way; but yet he did not leave the room. He stole to the window, and flung himself down on two chairs, as if looking into the street from behind the blind; but he saw nothing that passed out of doors, so eager was his hope of hearing something of the Crofton boys,—their trap-ball, and their Saturday walk with the usher. Not a word of this kind did he hear. As soon as Mr Tooke had agreed to stay to dinner, his sisters were desired to carry their work elsewhere,—to the leads, if they liked; and he was told that he might go to play. He had hoped he might be overlooked in the window; and unwillingly did he put down first one leg and then the other from the chairs, and saunter out of the room. He did not choose to go near his sisters, to be told how stupidly he had stood in the gentleman’s way; so, when he saw that they were placing their stools on the leads, he went up into the attic, and then down into the kitchen, to see where little Harry was, to play at schoolboys in the back yard.

The maid Susan was not sorry that Harry was taken off her hands; for she wished to rub up her spoons, and fill her castors afresh, for the sake of the visitor who had come in. The thoughtful Jane soon came down with the keys to get out a clean tablecloth, and order a dish of cutlets, in addition to the dinner, and consult with Susan about some dessert; so that, as the little boys looked up from their play, they saw Agnes sitting alone at work upon the leads.

They had played some time, Hugh acting a naughty boy who could not say his Latin lesson to the usher, and little Harry punishing him with far more words than a real usher uses on such an occasion, when they heard Agnes calling them from above their heads. She was leaning over from the leads, begging Hugh to come up to her,—that very moment. Harry must be left below, as the leads were a forbidden place for him. So Harry went to Jane, to see her dish up greengage plums which he must not touch: and Hugh ran up the stairs. As he passed through the passage, his mother called him. Full of some kind of hope (he did not himself know what), he entered the parlour, and saw Mr Tooke’s eyes fixed on him. But his mother only wanted him to shut the door as he passed; that was all. It had stood open, as it usually did on warm days. Could his mother wish it shut on account of anything she was saying? It was possible.

“O Hugh!” exclaimed Agnes, as soon as he set foot on the leads. “What do you think?—But is the parlour-door shut? Who shut it?”

“Mother bade me shut it, as I passed.”

“O dear!” said Agnes, in a tone of disappointment; “then she did not mean us to hear what they were talking about.”

“What was it? Anything about the Crofton boys? Anything about Phil?”

“I cannot tell you a word about it. Mamma did not know I heard them. How plain anyone can hear what they say in that parlour, Hugh, when the door is open! What do you think I heard mamma tell Mrs Bicknor, last week, when I was jumping Harry off the third stair?”

“Never mind that. Tell me what they are talking about now. Do, Agnes.”

Agnes shook her head.

“Now do, dear.”

It was hard for Agnes to refuse Hugh anything, at any time; more still when he called her “dear,” which he seldom did; and most of all when he put his arm round her neck, as he did now. But she answered—

“I should like to tell you every word; but I cannot now. Mamma has made you shut the door. She does not wish you to hear it.”

“Me! Then will you tell Jane?”

“Yes. I shall tell Jane, when we are with mamma at work.”

“That is too bad!” exclaimed Hugh, flinging himself down on the leads so vehemently that his sister was afraid he would roll over into the yard. “What does Jane care about Crofton and the boys to what I do?”

“There is one boy there that Jane cares about more than you do, or I, or anybody, except papa and mamma. Jane loves Phil.”

“O, then, what they are saying in the parlour is about Phil.”

“I did not say that.”

“You pretend you love me as Jane loves Phil! And now you are going to tell her what you won’t tell me! Agnes, I will tell you everything I know all my whole life, if you will just whisper this now. Only just whisper.—Or, I will tell you what. I will guess and guess; and you can nod or shake your head. That won’t be telling.”

“For shame, Hugh! Phil would laugh at you for being a girl if you are so curious. What mamma told Mrs Bicknor was that Jane was her right-hand. What do you think that meant exactly?”

“That Jane might give you a good slap when you are so provoking,” said Hugh, rolling over and over, till his clothes were covered with dust, and Agnes really thought once that he was fairly going over the edge into the yard.

“There is something that I can tell you, Hugh; something that I want to tell you, and nobody else,” said Agnes,