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 "What rubbish Mr. Moore stores up in his desk!" he said: "I hope he won't keep my old exercises so carefully."

"What is it?"

"Old copy-books."

He threw the bundle to Caroline. The packet looked so neat externally, her curiosity was excited to see its contents.

"If they are only copy-books, I suppose I may open them?"

"Oh! yes; quite freely. Mr. Moore's desk is half mine—for he lets me keep all sorts of things in it—and I give you leave."

On scrutiny, they proved to be French compositions, written in a hand peculiar but compact, and exquisitely clean and clear. The writing was recognisable: she scarcely needed the further evidence of the name signed at the close of each theme, to tell her whose they were. Yet that name astonished her: "Shirley Keeldar, Sympson Grove, shire" (a southern county), and a date four years back.

She tied up the packet, and held it in her hand, meditating over it. She half felt as if, in opening it, she had violated a confidence.

"They are Shirley's, you see," said Henry, carelessly.

"Did you give them to Mr. Moore? She wrote them with Mrs. Pryor, I suppose?"

"She wrote them in my school-room at Sympson