Seven Little Australians

t and a C

et pale

e pale

eyes with te

epened, and a white star or two came out and blinked up away in the high, far heavens. Down behind the gum trees, across the river, there was a still whiter moon; a stretch of water near was beginning to smile up to it. Meg hoped it would not climb past the tree-tops

her ever since six o'cloc

om the paths of truth he was absolutely wretched until he had confessed, and rubbed his

I must sorrowfully acknowledge this seemed a truer view of the case than believing the boy was really impressed with the heinousness of his offence and anxious to make amends. For the very next day,

ished himself at Meg's elbow, and kept looking up into her face in a yearning love-and-forgive-me kind of way that she found infinitely embarrassing; for she had begun to suspect, from his stran

nce, giving her a tearful, imploring look, that sh

ay dog that had come to Misrule in the afternoon, she slipped out of the room unobserved. No one was in the hall, and she picked up

cultivated shrubs, stretched silver-white arms up to the moon and gave the little hurrying figure a ghostly kind of feeling. Out of the gate and into the first paddock, where the rose scent did not come at al

-Meg; t-take it," Bunty said,

g creeping here like this?" Meg said, angr

u, M-M-Meggie," the little boy sa

, and was burying his nose in her white

Now go home, Bunty; I want to have a q

eyes as they would go, his mouth opene

st-st-story;" he wept, rocki

mpatiently. "You always ARE telling stories, Bunt

b-about it," he said, still engaged

nimously, "only don't do it again. Now run away at once, or y

ds. His heart was perfectly light again as he turned to go b

id gently. "You're only a girl, so I don't 'spe

ry back: think of your map," Meg returned, i

he house. And Meg let down the slip-rail, put it back in its place with tr

a rustle, not a sound of a voice, not a sound of the affec

among the bushes; there was a tal

in her anxiety that she never called him by his Chri

r, and, looking closely, she

d, in an inde

, shamed bound, and then seem

bad an opinion of her; but his face wore the contemptuous l

evening," she said, with miserable lameness; and then in a to

inst he fence and

seemed addressed to me, and I was told

ndrew," she said not l

"but Andrew has not come back to-night yet, so I came in

ut her hand up and drew the cl

urled a li

gh you may not think so. Oh yes, I know you said you did not want to be kissed

ak, and the calm, mer

o you not think so? Still, perhaps we can find a darker place farther on, and then I can

aid Meg, in a

m such a nice little girl," he said quietly; "what have you let that horrid

nt on with a gentle earnestness that

. I imagined how I should feel if my little sister Flossie ever fell in with such a girl, and began to flirt and make

ence and began to sob-little, dry, heartbro

te," he said remorsefully; "forgive me, won't you? Please, littl

Meg lifted her face half a second, white and pathet

id brokenly; "I didn't want to come this walk-and oh! indeed, indeed,

I am a great rough brute, and don't know how to talk to a little, tender g

armly. Then they walked up the paddocks together,

ood-bye; and he answered encouragingly, "No, I am quite sure you won't-leave it to girls