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 stay. But that was none of Alice Eveley's business. It was a matter for Miriam alone to decide, and she should not be hampered in her decision. In a sense it was Keble's business too. Certainly not his wife's, though long before Keble's sister had appeared on the scene, Louise had sometimes arrested herself, as Alice had done, and chosen a different course in order not to break in on some apparent community of interest between her husband and Miriam Cread.

A perambulator appeared at the corner of the terrace, propelled by a stolid nursemaid. The monkey, rosy and fat, was making lunges at a white hillock in his coverings which he would have been surprised to know was his own foot. On seeing his mother he abandoned the hillock to give her a perky inspection. His bonnet had slid down over one eye, and the tip of his tongue protruded at the opposite corner of his mouth.

Louise broke into a laugh. "Katie! Make that child put in his tongue or else straighten his hat. He looks such an awful rake with both askew."

Katie missed the fine point of the monkey's resemblance to a garden implement, but, as Dare had recognized, Katie was as immortal in her ignorance as philosophers are in their erudition. She straightened the monkey's headgear, this adjustment being less fraught with complications than an attempt to reinstate his tongue.

"His granpa and gramma come into the nursery before breakfast," Katie proudly announced. "They