"What an extraordinary thing! Was ever anything so strange!" Daphne, the younger girl, was overcome with excitement at the coincidence. "I wonder if we shall see you sometimes! We might each walk half-way and meet.

Wouldn't it be fun! Are you going to stay long?"

"Oh, yes, for a year, most likely. It is my home."

"Oh!" They all looked puzzled. Most people lived at home always; they did not come on a twelve-months' visit, or speak in quite that tone about their home-coming. But Audrey offered no explanations, and they were too polite to ask for any.

"Oh," said Daphne again. "Well, I don't suppose we shall be at Abbot's Field as long as that. We are going to stay with grandpapa, Mr. Vivian.

He lives at 'The Orchard.' Do you know him?"

Audrey shook her head. "I--I don't remember the people round about Moor End--at least, not very well. I have been living with my granny for four years!"

All the laughter and joy had died out of her heart, and from her face.

She was visibly embarra.s.sed. She thought of her home, the shabbiness and untidiness of it as it used to be, and she did not expect it to be much better now, even though Faith was four years older, and she felt a shamed shrinking from letting these strangers see it. She had spoken the truth when she said she did not know Mr. Vivian, but she did remember that 'The Orchard' was a large place, and the house one of the finest in the neighbourhood.

She hoped, she hoped, oh, so fervently, that they would never come over to Moor End to look her up; that they would not ask her her name, or where she lived. If they knew her father was the vicar, they would be coming over to hear him preach, and then she would not be able to avoid introducing them, and then they would see and know all!

A shade of embarra.s.sment hung over the rest of the journey. Audrey was uncomfortable. She was ashamed and nervous, and troubled at her own lack of frankness. She was also, fortunately, ashamed of being ashamed, but she had yet to learn how to rise above herself; to know what are the things she should feel shame for.

It was almost a relief to her when at last the train drew up at Kingfield, and they all had to change carriages; for no one could help feeling that little shade of embarra.s.sment. And she was even more glad when the porter, who looked after her luggage for her, put her into a carriage apart from the Vivians, for now she felt she could escape the necessity of introducing to them whoever might be at the station to meet her at Moor End. Indeed, it was just possible that they might not see if anyone met her.

Yet, when the feeling of relief entered her heart, all other joy went out of it, for she did love her father, she did love them all, and it hurt her to feel ashamed. She liked her new friends too, so much, and wanted them to like her. Tears rose in her eyes as the truth came home to her that she was being false to those who loved her, and to those who had been so kind to her--and all for what?

She did not answer the question, but stood up and stared out of the window, that those within the carriage might not see her face. And so Mr.

Carlyle, Deborah and Tom saw her as the train drew up, and her father's heart rejoiced at her--as he thought--anxiety to catch the first glimpse of them after their long separation.

"Has it been a very long and dreary journey, dear?" he asked, as he put his arm round her shoulders and kissed her. "Did you have company, or have you had to come all the way alone?"

"I had very nice company, part of the way," she answered, and blushed hotly, as, glancing out under the brim of her hat, she caught sight of Keith Vivian and Irene hanging out of their window looking at her.

"Perhaps I had better get a porter and see about my luggage," she added hastily. It was very tiresome that they should have to wait on the platform until the train went out, before they were allowed to cross the line by the footway. But it always was so on the down platform of the little Moor End station.

To Tom and Debby one of their greatest treats was to stand and see the engine puff in and puff out on its way again. Audrey grew quite cross with the eager and shabby little pair who would stand so prominently forward, and stare so hard. With a hoot and a puff and a snort the engine moved slowly on, and the Vivians' carriage drew nearer. Daphne was at the window now, as well as Irene and Keith, their hands waving wildly in farewell greeting.

"Good-bye! Good-bye!" they called out, as cheerfully as though they had not noticed the cloud which had fallen on the end of their happy journey.

"Perhaps we shall see you----" the rattle drowned the end of their greeting, and saved Audrey the necessity of replying.

"Oh! oh! Audrey, you pushed right in front of me. I couldn't see a thing, and your elbow b.u.mped me in the eye!"

Audrey stepped back quickly; she blushed and looked embarra.s.sed. She had not meant to b.u.mp her little sister in the eye, but she had meant to get in front of her and hide from view her shabby frock and patched boots.

She had done it deliberately.

"I am very sorry, Debby, if I hurt you," she said stiffly, "but you do make a fuss about a trifle!"

"Debby doesn't," contradicted Tom, fierce in his favourite sister's defence, "Debby has more pluck than--than----"

"Tom, boy, come here," interposed Mr. Carlyle quietly. "You and Debby can carry this rug-strap between you, can't you?"

"Were those your travelling-companions?" he asked interestedly turning to Audrey as the little pair, their indignation forgotten, trotted homewards proudly with their burden.

"Yes," answered Audrey briefly. She said no more, she felt she could not, but she knew that the shadow which had fallen on her own pleasure, had fallen also on others.

CHAPTER III.

Between Moor End vicarage and the road stretched a long narrow strip of garden, at least, a strip of ill-kept gra.s.s and some shabby bushes.

A wall divided the garden from the road, a wall so low that garden, house, and all, were exposed to the view of every pa.s.ser-by. The strip of gra.s.s was the children's play place, for the garden behind the house was divided up into beds of carrots, cabbages, turnips, potatoes and all manner of other things, so that there was no room left for a good game.

Not only was there no room, but old Job Toms, who came once or twice a week to 'do' the vegetable garden, threatened such dire punishment to anyone who made a footmark on one of his beloved beds, that the children were almost afraid to step inside the gate.

However, the front garden made up for it, there were no beds there--at least none to worry about. There had been two down by the gate at one time, but there was nothing in them now, and the children were allowed to do just as they liked there. They had the added joy too of seeing everyone who pa.s.sed along the road and everyone who came to the house.

Deborah and Tom had been playing there when their father called them to know if they would like to go with him to the station; and their toys were lying about just as they had left them when they flew away to wash their hands and brush their hair.

Audrey glancing over the wall, eager for a first sight of her home after all the long time she had been absent from it, saw an old pair of kitchen bellows, numberless sc.r.a.ps of paper, a broken battledore, a shabby straw hat, and three grubby, battered dolls perched up against an old tub, which had once contained flowers, but had long since ceased to do so.

The sight would have jarred on most, but to eyes accustomed to the primness of Granny Carlyle's house it was ugly and unsightly in the extreme. To Audrey, tired, irritable, already depressed, the sight was as jarring as it possibly could be. "Was this really home? Was this the sort of thing she would have to endure for twelve long, weary months?"

A great gloom weighed upon her. She walked in without a word, her heart full to bursting.

The look of the house was not more cheering than the garden. In three of the four bedroom windows facing her, the low blinds sagged in the middle and fell away from the sides. In the fourth window alone were the curtains clean and neat, this was the room which was being got ready for Audrey. Over the top of the low blind Faith's head suddenly appeared, and Faith's face beamed out a welcome.

"There is your sister," said Mr. Carlyle, more cheerfully than he had spoken since they left the station. "I expect she is putting finishing touches to your room. Come down," he called up to the open window, but Faith was already coming over the stairs with a rush.

"You have come!" she cried excitedly, hopping over two pairs of shoes and a rattle which strewed the hall floor, "the train must have been very punctual. I was hurrying to clear another shelf in my cupboard for Audrey."

Audrey's heart sank even lower. Then she was expected to share a room with Faith. "Couldn't I--need I disturb--couldn't I have another room,"

she stammered. "It--it seems too bad to turn you out."

"Oh, you aren't turning me out," laughed Faith. "We have the old nursery for our room, it is so nice and large; there is heaps of room too for Joan's cot to stand beside my bed. I have cleared two shelves in the wardrobe by tipping everything out on to my bed. I must find somewhere to put it all before I go to bed, or I shall have to sleep on the floor--but we shall both settle down in time. Come and see mother, Audrey, she is longing to see you."

"How is she," asked Audrey, as they mounted the stairs together.

"Is she really very ill?"

"No--not what you would call very ill. She was last year, and she will never be really well again unless she rests for a whole year."

"It's an awfully long time, isn't it?" said Audrey dejectedly. "When does it count from? From when she was so ill, or--or from when father wrote for me to come home?" She was already calculating in how many weeks time she would be able to get away, and back to Farbridge and granny.

Faith looked at her sister, her soft brown eyes full of mild surprise.

"Oh, I don't know. I don't suppose Dr. Gray can tell to a few weeks, or even months. A lot depends on how quiet she keeps. He said that perhaps by next spring or summer she would be quite well again, and able to go about."

"Oh!" Audrey's face fell, but before she could say anything more, Faith opened a door and in another moment Audrey was in her mother's arms.

"Oh, my dear, my dear, I am so glad to see you. I hardly realised what a great big daughter I possessed. How you have grown, Audrey, and how nice you look, darling. You are going to be tall, like your father, and you have his features." Audrey's face brightened, fond as she was of her mother, it was her father she wished to resemble. Faith had her mother's short tip-tilted nose and big brown eyes, and Audrey had many times envied her the latter, but if she herself had her father's straight nose and aristocratic features, she felt she would not grudge Faith her pretty eyes. Faith was short too--as her mother was--a soft, sweet dumpling of a girl. Audrey admired tall people.

She glanced about her mother's room interestedly and with a happier face.

Here, at any rate, all was comfortable and orderly. The litter that lay about was the litter of books and papers, which was what Audrey liked.

Perhaps things would not, after all, be as bad as at first they seemed.