He was at the nursery door now, turning the handle with hesitating hands.
"What a time you've been," said Meg from the table, where she was mending a boxful of her gloves.

"Well, what did she say ?" Just at her elbow was the gay _bonbonniere_ containing the brown, cream-encrusted walnuts.
"She said, 'All right,'" said Bunty gruffly.
Meg counted the eight chocolates out into his little grimy hand, and resumed her mending with a relieved sigh.

And Bunty, with a defiant, shamed look in his eyes, stuffed the whole of the sweets into his mouth at once, as if to preclude the possibility of a sudden repentance.
The other note was equally unfortunate.

Little Flossie went home, her thoughts intent upon a certain Grannie bonnet Nell had promised to make for her new doll.
"Gween with pink stwings," she was saying softly to herself as she climbed the steps to her own door.
Alan was lying on the veranda lounge, smoking his black pipe.
"Gween what ?" he laughed--"guinea-pigs or kangaroos ?" "Clawice Maud's bonnet," the little girl said, and entered forthwith into a grave discussion with him as to the colour he thought more suitable for that waxen lady's winter cloak.
Then she turned to go in.
"What's that sticking out of your wee pocket, Flossie girl ?" he said, as she brushed past him.

She stopped a second and felt.
"Oh, nearly I didn't wemember, an' I pwomised I would--it's a letter for you, Alan," she said, and gave Meg's poor little epistle up into the very hands of the Philistine..