To Miss Garth's horror, Magdalen's arm was unmistakably round Frank's neck; and, worse still, the position of her face, at the moment of discovery, showed beyond all doubt that she had just been offering to the victim of Chinese commerce the first and foremost of all the consolations which a woman can bestow on a man.

In plainer words, she had just given Frank a kiss.
In the presence of such an emergency as now confronted her, Miss Gart h felt instinctively that all ordinary phrases of reproof would be phrases thrown away.
"I presume," she remarked, addressing Magdalen with the merciless self-possession of a middle-aged lady, unprovided for the occasion with any kissing remembrances of her own--"I presume (whatever excuses your effrontery may suggest) you will not deny that my duty compels me to mention what I have just seen to your father ?" "I will save you the trouble," replied Magdalen, composedly.

"I will mention it to him myself." With those words, she looked round at Frank, standing trebly helpless in a corner of the summer-house.

"You shall hear what happens," she said, with her bright smile.

"And so shall you," she added for Miss Garth's especial benefit, as she sauntered past the governess on her way back to the breakfast-table.