here's my fare. I'm sorry I forgot it, and how am I to get my box up to my house?"

"Get your box up? Why the same way as you'll get yourself up. Hop inside again, and I'll drive 'ee both up in a minute. I promised your mother I would. You hold on to your money now, it'll be time enough to settle up when I've done my job," and the old man chuckled amiably at his little joke.

But Mona did not want to get back into the close, stuffy van again, and sit there in solitary state, with everyone who passed by staring at her. So, as soon as John Darbie was safely on the top and busy amongst the boxes there, she walked quietly out of the yard and into the street.

How familiar it all was, and how unchanged! After Milbrook—the little ugly new town, scarcely worthy the name of town—and the hamlet where her granny lived, the street and houses looked small and old-fashioned, but they looked homelike and strong. The Milbrook houses, with their walls half a brick thick, and their fronts all bow-windows, would not have lasted any time in little stormy, wind-swept Seacombe. Experience had taught Seacombe folk that their walls must be nearly as solid as the cliffs on which many of them were built, and the windows must be small and set deep in the walls; otherwise they were as likely as not to be blown in altogether when the winter storms raged; that roofs must come well down to meet the little windows, like heavy brows protecting the eyes beneath, which under their shelter, could gaze out defiantly at sea and storm.

To Mona, seeing them again after many months' absence, the houses looked rough and poor, and plain; yet she loved them, and, as she walked up the steep, narrow street, she glanced about her with eager, glowing eyes. For the time her loneliness and nervousness were forgotten. Here and there someone recognised her, but at that hour there were never many people about.

"Why, Mona Carne! is it really you! Well, your mother and father'll be glad to have you home again." Mona beamed gratefully on the speaker.

"Is it really Mona," cried another. "Why, now, you've grown! I didn't know you till Mrs. Row said your name!"

Mona began to feel less forlorn and ill-used, and she was more glad than ever that she had on her best clothes, and had put her hair up in squibs the night before.

Outside one of the few shops Seacombe possessed, she drew up and looked in at the windows with interest. They had improved a little. The draper's was particularly gay with new spring things, and to Mona who had not seen a shop lately, unless she walked the three miles to Milbrook, the sight was fascinating. One window was full of ties, gloves, and ribbons; the other was as gay as a garden with flowers of every kind and colour, all blooming at once. Many of them were crude and common, but to Mona's eyes they were beautiful. There were wreaths of wall-flowers, of roses, and of lilacs, but the prettiest of all to Mona was one of roses and forget-me-nots woven in together.

"Oh," she gasped, "how I'd love to have that one! Oh, I'd love it!" There were hats in the window, too. Pretty, light, wide-brimmed hats. Mona's eyes travelled backwards and forwards over them till she saw one of the palest green straw, the colour of a duck's egg.

"Oh, wouldn't the roses and forget-me-nots look lovely on that, with just a bow of white ribbon at the back. Oh, I wish——"

"Why, it's Mona Carne!" cried a voice behind her, and Mona, wheeling swiftly round, found Millie Higgins at her elbow.

"Why, who ever would have thought of meeting you strolling up the street just as though you had never been away!" cried Millie. "But you've grown, Mona. You are ever so much taller than when you went away, and your hair's longer too. Do you think I am changed?"

Mona was delighted. She wanted to be tall, and she wanted to have nice long hair. She had never cared for Millie Higgins before, but at that moment she felt that she liked her very much indeed, and they chattered eagerly to each other, lost to everything but the news they had to pour into each other's ears.

After a little while, though, Millie tired of talking. She wanted to get on, and what Millie wanted to do she generally did. "I must fly—and there's your poor mother home worrying herself all this time to a fiddle-string, wondering what has become of you. She expected the van an hour ago, and had got your tea all ready and waiting for you."

Mona started guiltily, and then began to excuse herself. "Well, we were late in coming, we were so long on the road. Mr. Darbie said he'd drive me up, but I liked walking best. If I had gone up by the van I shouldn't have been there yet, so it's all the same."

"The van! Why, it's gone by. Only a minute ago, though. If you run you'll be there almost as soon as he will."

Without staying to say good-bye, Mona ran, but either Millie's minute had been a very long one, or 'Lion' had stepped out more briskly at the end of the day than at the beginning, for when Mona got to the house John Darbie was just coming away. "Thank'ee, ma'am," he was saying, and Mona saw him putting some coins in his pocket.

"I've got the——" she began to call out to him, but stopped, for her new mother came out to the gate, and looked anxiously down the hill. She was looking for herself, Mona knew, and a fit of shyness came over her which drove every other thought from her mind.

But almost as quickly as the shyness came it disappeared again, for Lucy's eyes fell on her, and, her face alight with pleasure, Lucy came forward with arms outstretched in welcome. "Why, you poor little tired thing, you," she cried, kissing her warmly, "you must be famished! Come in, do. I was quite frightened about you, for I've been expecting you this hour and more, and then when Mr. Darbie came, and brought only your box, it seemed as if I wasn't ever going to see you. Come in, dear," drawing Mona's arm through her own, and leading her into the house. "Sit down and rest a bit before you go up to see your room."

Exhausted with excitement, and talking, and the extra exertion, Lucy herself had to sit down for a few minutes to get her breath. Mona, more tired than she realised until she came to sit down, lay back in her father's big chair and looked about her with shy interest. How familiar it all seemed, yet how changed. Instead of the old torn, soiled drab paper, the walls were covered with a pretty blue one, against which the dresser and table and the old familiar china showed up spotless and dainty; the steel on the stove might have been silver, the floor was as clean and snowy as the table.

Mona's memory of it all was very different. In those days there had been muddle, dust, grease everywhere, the grate was always greasy and choked with ashes, the table sloppy and greasy, the floor unwashed, even unswept, the dressers with more dust than anything else on them. Mona could scarcely believe that the same place and things could look so different.

"Oh, how nice it all is," she said in a voice full of admiration, and Lucy smiled with pleasure. She knew that many girls would not have admitted any improvement even if they had seen it.

"Shall we go upstairs now?" she said. "I've got my breath again," and she led the way up the steep little staircase, which Mona remembered so well.

"You know the way to your old room, don't you?"

Mona walked ahead to it, but at the door she drew up with a cry of delight. "Oh, Mother!" she turned to say with a beaming face, and without noticing that she had called her by the name about which she and granny had debated so long.

Lucy noticed it though, and coloured with pleasure. She had felt more shy than had Mona, about suggesting what her stepchild should call her. "Thank you, dear, for calling me that," she said, putting her arm about her and kissing her. "I didn't know, I wondered how you would feel about it."

But Mona was too delighted with everything she saw to feel anything but pleasure and gratitude then. The walls had been papered with a pretty