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168 my cheeks); "but I am not sorry, for you will be happy, dear! But Alice, Alice, papa!"

"His capers, you mean?"

"He will kill us!" I say, with conviction. "Do not ever expect to receive any account of what happens after you leave, for there will not be one man left to tell the tale! You may look in the Times for the following announcement: "At Silverbridge, the wife and eleven children of Colonel Adair, the sad result of domestic circumstances over which he had no control."

"Indeed, I do think of you all very much," says Alice: "it makes me very miserable."

"Don't fret, dear; we have weathered storms enough, and why not this! When are you going?"

"To-morrow!"

"Oh, Alice! And you are going to Mr. Skipworth's to-night?"

"Yes; that was why we fixed to-morrow. Charles's man will get all the boxes out of the house, and Tabitha will help him."

"And would you have gone without telling me?" I ask, putting my arms round her neck and raining down a steady drip of tears on her pretty head.

"I should have wished you good-bye, dear, but I did not mean to tell you, for fear he should ask you all round afterwards if you knew anything."

"Milly knows?"

"Yes."

"And mother?"

"Good heavens, no! How shall ever say good-bye to her? She will see you have been crying, Nell."

"Do you think you will ever come back?" I ask piteously. "Do you think you will go away for ever?"

"No, no," she says; "we will come and see you at school, Charles and I, next half, and we shall stay somewhere near here, so as to see mother. Besides, sooner or later, it will be made up."