everything over anyhow, to get at her nightdress, and so had left them. It had taken her quite as long to find the nightdress as it would have to lift the things out and put them in their proper places, for the garment was almost at the bottom of the box, but Mona did not think of that. Now, though, when she wanted to find her morning frock and apron, she grew impatient and irritable. "Perhaps if I tip everything out on the floor I'll find the old things that way!" she snapped crossly. "I s'pose I shan't find them until they've given me all the trouble they can," and she had actually thrown a few things in every direction, when she suddenly stopped and sat back on her heels.

"I've half a mind to put on my best dress again, then I can come and look for the old one when I ain't in such a hurry." The dress—her best one— was lying temptingly on a chair close beside her. She hesitated, looked at it again, and picked it up. As she did so, something fell out of the pocket. It was her purse, the little blue one her granny had bought for her at Christmas. She picked it up and opened it, and as she did so the colour rushed over her face. In one of the pockets was the eighteenpence which had been given to her to pay John Darbie with. "I—I suppose I ought to have given it to mother, but it went right out of my head." She completed her dressing in a thoughtful mood, but she did find, and put on, her old morning dress. "I suppose I had better tell her—about the money." She put the blue purse in a drawer, however, and tossed in a lot of things on top of it.

When at last she got downstairs it was already past half-past eight, and the fire was burning low again. "Oh, dear," she cried, irritably, "how ever am I going to get breakfast with a fire like that and how am I to know what to get or where anything is kept. I think I might have had a day or two given me to settle down in. I s'pose I'd better get some sticks first and make the fire up. Bother the old thing, it only went out just to vex me!"

She was feeling hungry and impatient, and out of tune with everything. At Hillside she would have been just sitting down to a comfortable meal which had cost her no trouble to get. For the moment she wished she was back there again.

As she returned to the kitchen with her hands full of wood, her mother came down the stairs. She looked very white and ill, and very fragile, but she was fully dressed.

"I thought you were too bad to get up," said Mona, unsmilingly. "I was going to bring you up some breakfast as soon as I could, but the silly old fire was gone down——"

"I was afraid it would. That was why I got up. I couldn't be still, I was so fidgeted about your father's breakfast. He'll be home for it in a few minutes. He's had a busy morning, and must want something."

Mona looked glummer than ever. "I never had to get up early at granny's," she said in a reproachful voice. "I ain't accustomed to it. I s'pose I shall have to get so."

"Did you let your grandmother—did your grandmother come down first and get things ready for you?" asked Lucy, surprised; and something in her voice, or words, made Mona feel ashamed, instead of proud of the fact.

"Granny liked getting up early," she said, excusingly. Lucy did not make any comment, and Mona felt more ashamed than if she had.

"Hasn't father had his breakfast yet?" she asked presently. "He always used to come home for it at eight."

"He did to-day, but you see there wasn't any. The fire wasn't lighted even. He thought you were dressing, and he wouldn't let me get up. When he'd lighted the fire he went off to work again. He's painting his boat, and he said he'd finish giving her her first coat before he'd stop again; then she could be drying. I'll manage better another morning. I daresay I'll feel better to-morrow."

Lucy did look very unwell, and Mona's heart was touched. "I wish father had told me earlier," she said in a less grumbling tone. "I was awake at seven, and got up and looked out of the window. I never thought of dressing then, it seemed so early, and I didn't hear father moving."

"Never mind, dear, we will manage better another time. It's nice having you home, Mona; the house seems so much more cheerful. You will be a great comfort to us, I know."

Mona's ill-temper vanished. "I do want to be," she said shyly, "and I am glad to be home. Oh, mother, it was lovely to see the sea again. I felt—oh, I can't tell you how I felt when I first caught a glimpse of it. I don't know how ever I stayed away so long."

Lucy laughed ruefully. "I wish I loved it like that," she said, "but I can't make myself like it even. It always makes me feel miserable."

A heavy step was heard on the cobbled path outside, and for a moment a big body cut off the flood of sunshine pouring in at the doorway. "Is breakfast ready?" demanded Peter Carne's loud, good-tempered voice. "Hullo, Lucy! Then you got up, after all! Well—of all the obstinate women!"

Lucy smiled up at him bravely. "Yes, I've got down to breakfast. I thought I'd rather have it down here with company than upstairs alone. Isn't it nice having Mona home, father?"

Peter laughed. "I ain't going to begin by spoiling the little maid with flattery, but yet, 'tis very," and he beamed good-naturedly on both. "Now, then, let's begin. I'm as hungry as a hunter."

By that time the cloth was laid, a dish of fried bacon and bread was keeping hot in the oven, and smelling most appetisingly to hungry folk, and the kettle was about to boil over. Through the open doorway the sunshine and the scent of wallflowers poured in.

"Them there wallflowers beat anything I ever came across for smell," remarked Peter as he finished his second cup of tea.

"I dreamed about wallflowers," said Mona, "and I seemed to smell them quite strong," and she told them her dream—at least a part of it. She left out about the forget-me-nots that she rowed and rowed to try and get. She could not have told why she left out that part, but already a vague thought had come to her—one that she was ashamed of, even though it was so vague, and it had to do with forget-me-nots.

All the time she had been helping about the breakfast, and all the time after, when she and her stepmother were alone again, she kept saying to herself, "Shall I give her the money, shall I keep it?" and her heart would thrill, and then sink, and inside her she kept saying, "There is no harm in it?—It is all the same in the end." And then, almost before she knew what she was doing, she had taken the easy, crooked, downhill path, with its rocks and thorns so cleverly hidden.

"Mona, haven't you got any print frocks for mornings, and nice aprons?"

Mona's thoughts came back suddenly from "Shall I? Shall I not?" and the eyes with which she looked at her mother were half shamed, half frightened. "Any—any what?" she stuttered.

"Nice morning aprons and washing frocks? I don't like to see shabby, soiled ones, even for only doing work in."

"I hadn't thought about it," said Mona, with more interest. "What else can one wear? I nearly put on my best one, but I thought I hadn't better."

"Oh, no, not your best."

"Well, what else is there to wear? Do you always have a print one like you've got on now?"

"Yes, and big aprons, and sleeves. Then one can tell when they are dirty."

"Oh, I thought you put on that 'cause you were wearing out what you'd got left over. You were in service, weren't you, before you married father?"

"Yes."

"I haven't got any print dresses. I haven't even got a white one. I've two aprons like this," holding out a fanciful thing trimmed with lace. "That's all, and I never saw any sleeves; I don't know what they are like."

"I'll have to get you some as soon as father has his next big haul. You'd like to wear nice clean prints, if you'd got them, wouldn't you?"

"Oh, yes!" eagerly. But after a moment she added: "I do want a summer hat, though, and I don't s'pose I could have both?" Her eyes sought her