Nell of Shorne Mills

It was Dick, and he approached them, yelling: "Nell! Nell! Where on earth are you, Nell?"

They had barely time to move before he was upon them.

"I say, Nell, where on earth have you been? I'm starving----Hallo!" he

broke off, staring first at Nell's red and downcast face, and then at

Drake's smiling and quite obviously joyous one. "What----"

Drake took Nell's hand.

"We quite forgot you, Dick, and everybody and everything else. But

you'll forgive us when you hear that Nell and I have--have----"

"Made it up again!" finished Dick, with a grin that ran from ear to ear.

"By George, you don't say so! Well, I said it was only a tiff; now,

didn't I, Nell? But it was a pretty long one. Eighteen months or

thereabouts, isn't it?"

For a moment the two lovers looked sad, then Drake smiled.

"Just eighteen months too long, Dick," he said. "But you might wish us

joy."

"I do, I do--or I would, if I wasn't starving!" retorted Dick. "While

you have been spooning under the spreading chestnut tree, I've been

wrestling with the electric dynamos; and the sight of even bread and

cheese would melt me to tears. But I am glad, old man," he said, in a

grave tone--"glad for both your sakes; for any one could see with

three-quarters of an eye, to be exact, that you were both miserable

without each other. Oh, save me from the madness of love!"

"There was a very pretty girl by the name of Angel at the Maltbys'

dance," put in Drake musingly; "a very pretty girl, indeed, who sat out

most of the dances, if I remember rightly, with a young friend of mine."

Dick's face grew a healthy, brick-dust red, and he glanced shyly from

one to the other.

"Well hit, Drake, old man!" he said. "Yes; there was one, and I've seen

her in London once or twice----"

"Oh, Dick, and you never told me!" said Nell reproachfully.

"I don't tell you everything, little girl," he remarked severely; "and I

won't tell you any more now unless you come on and give me something to

eat. See here, now; I'll walk in front, and promise not to look

round----"

Nell, blushing painfully, looked at Drake appealingly, and he seized

Dick by the arm and marched him off in the direction of the lodge, Nell

following more slowly.

As they entered, the nurse came down from Falconer's room, and Nell

inquired after him anxiously.