Mrs. Codman was sitting in a little room opening out from the breakfast-room, which had been appropriated as a sort of study by Bert and herself.

Topsy, the kitten, who had not yet attained the sobriety and demureness of old cat-hood, was running round after her tail.

"Oh, dear," sighed Bert, who was puzzling over a lesson in geography, "I can't study any to-day."

"Why not?" asked Mrs. Codman.

"Oh, I feel so restless."

"That isn't very unusual, is it?" asked her governess, with a smile.

"I feel more so than usual. Something is going to happen, I know."

"Something does happen every day, doesn't there?"

[294]

"Well, you know what I mean; something out of the way. I shouldn't wonder if Charlie got home to-day."

"Heaven grant he may!" exclaimed his mother, fervently.

By a strange coincidence—and coincidences do sometimes happen in real life, though not quite so often, perhaps, as in stories,—Mrs. Codman had hardly given utterance to her wish when the bell rang.

Bert jumped from her seat.

"It is he, I know it is!" she exclaimed. "Do let me go to the door."

"You are very fanciful to-day, Bert," said Mrs. Codman. But she did not forbid her going. Bert's earnestness had given birth to a wild hope on her part, that it might be as she had fancied.

Before the loitering servant had a chance to reach the door, Bert had already opened it.

Bill Sturdy and Charlie stood on the steps, Charlie looking handsome and manly, with an eager look on his bright face. Sturdy, it must be owned, looked and felt a little[295] awkward, not being accustomed to call as a visitor at houses as elegant as Mr. Bowman's.

"Oh! this is Charlie, isn't it?" exclaimed Bert, with childish delight, instinctively putting out her hand.

"What, do you know me?" asked Charlie, pleased with this cordial reception, but astonished at being recognized.

"Oh, yes."

"Is my mother here?"

"Yes; I will go and call her. But won't you come in?"

"I would rather you would call her," said Charlie, bashfully.

Bert danced back into the little study.

"I was right, Mrs. Codman," said she, triumphantly, "It is Charlie."

"Has he come?" asked the mother, precipitately, letting fall, as she rose, the astonished kitten, who had clambered into her lap. "Oh, where is he?"

"At the door."

Mrs. Codman waited for no more, but hastened to the door, and, in a moment, the mother was face to face with her lost boy.[296] Of the delight of that meeting, of the numberless questions which each had to ask, with what fond pride the mother noted the increased manliness of Charlie, I cannot speak in detail. Both hearts were full to o............