Granny was much better, and was downstairs again, but she was weak and very helpless still. She was sad too, and depressed. The last few weeks had shaken her confidence in herself, her spirit was strong enough still, but more than once lately her body had failed her. When, in her old way, she had said that she would do this, or that, or the other thing, she had found out after all, that she could not. Her body had absolutely refused to obey her.

"I ain't dependent on other folks yet!" she had said sharply, and had afterwards found out that she was, and the discovery alarmed her. It saddened her, and broke her spirit.

"I ought to be in a home. I'd rather be in one, or—or be dead, than be a burden on other folks," she moaned.

Granny was very hard to live with in those days. Even a grown-up would have found it difficult to know what to say in answer to her complainings.

"Granny, don't talk like that!" Mona would plead, and she would work harder than ever that there might be nothing for granny to do, or to find fault with. But however hard she worked, and however nice she kept things, she always found that there were still some things left undone, and that those were the very things that, in granny's opinion, mattered most.

As for reading, or play-time, Mona never found any for either now, and oh, how often and how longingly her thoughts turned to the Quay, and to the rocks, and the games that were going on there evening after evening! Sometimes it almost seemed that she could hear the laughter and the calls, the voice of the sea, the rattle of the oars in the rowlocks, the cries of the gulls, and then she would feel as though she could not bear to be away from them all another moment. That she must race back to them then and there; never, never to leave them any more!

The loneliness, and the hard work, and the confinement to the house told on her. She became thin, the colour died out of her cheeks, and the gladness from her eyes, and all the life and joyousness seemed to go out of her. She grew, and grew rapidly, but she stooped so much she did not look as tall as she really was.

Granny Barnes, looking at her sweeping out the path one day, had her eyes suddenly opened, and the revelation startled her. She did not say anything to Mona, she just watched her carefully, but she did not again blame her for laziness; and while she watched her, her thoughts travelled backwards. A year ago Mona had been noisy, lively, careless, but cheerful, always full of some new idea. She had been round and rosy too, and full of mischief. Now she was listless, quiet, and apparently interested in nothing.

"Have you got a headache, Mona?"

"No," said Mona indifferently, "I don't think so."

"Is your back aching?"

"It always is."

"Then why didn't you say so, child?"

"What's the good? The work has to be done."

"If you're bad you must leave it undone. You can't go making yourself ill."

"I ain't ill, and I'd sooner do the work. There's nothing else to do."

"Can't you read sometimes? You used to be so fond of reading."

"If I read I forget to do things, and then——" She was going to say "there's a row," but she stopped herself just in time. "I've read all my books till I know them by heart nearly." Even while she spoke she was getting out the ironing cloth, and spreading it on the table. The irons were already hot on the stove.

Granny Barnes did not say any more, but sat for a long time gazing into the fire, apparently deep in thought. Mona looking up presently, attracted by the silence, was struck by her weary, drooping look, by the sadness of the tired old eyes. But she did not say anything. Presently granny roused herself and looked up. "Put away your ironing, child," she said kindly, "and go out and have a game of play. The air will do you good."

"I don't want to go out, granny. There's no one to play with—and I'm afraid to leave you; what could you do if you were to faint again?"

Granny sighed. The child was right. "I—I could knock in to Mrs. Lane, perhaps," she said, but there was doubt in her voice, and she did not press Mona any further.

Mona went on with her ironing, and granny went on staring into the fire, and neither spoke again for some time. Not until Mona, going over to take up a fresh hot iron, saw something bright shining on her grandmother's cheek, then fall on to her hand.

"Are you feeling bad again, granny?" she asked anxiously. The sight of the tear touched her, and brought a note of sympathy into her voice, and the sympathy in her voice in turn touched her granny, and drew both together.

"No—I don't know that I'm feeling worse than usual, but—but, well I feel that it'd be a good thing if my time was ended. I'm only a trouble and a burden now—no more help for anybody."

"Granny! Granny! You mustn't say such things!" Mona dropped her iron back on the stove again, and threw herself on the floor beside her grandmother. "You mustn't talk like that! You're weak, that's all. You want to rest for a bit and have some tonics. Mrs. Lane says so."

"Does she? I seem to want something," leaning her weary head against Mona's, "but it's more than tonics—it's a new body that I'm needing, I reckon. I daresay it's only foolishness, but sometimes I feel like a little child, I want to be took care of, and someone to make much of me, and say like mother used to, 'Now leave everything to me. I'll see to it all!' It seems to me one wants a bit of petting when one comes to the end of one's life, as much as one does at the beginning—I don't know but what a little is good for one at any age."

Mona slipped down till she sat on the floor at her granny's feet, her head resting against granny's knee. "I think so too," she said wistfully. Silence fell between them, broken only by the crackling of the fire within and the buzz of insects, and the calling of the birds, outside in the garden.

"Mona, how would you like it if we went into Seacombe to live?"

Mona was up in a moment, her face alight with eagerness, but some instinct stopped her from expressing too much delight. In the softened feeling which had crept into her heart, she realised that to her grandmother the move would mean a great wrench.

"She must love Hillside as much, or nearly as much as I love Seacombe," she told herself. Aloud she said, "I'd like it, but you wouldn't, would you, granny?"

"I think I would. I'd like to be nearer your father, and—and you would be happy there, and perhaps you'd feel stronger. I'm getting to feel," she added after a little pause, "that one can be happy anywhere, if those about one are happy. Or, to put it another way, one can't be happy anywhere if those about one ain't happy."

Mona felt very guilty. "Granny," she said, but in rather a choky voice, "I'll be happy here, if you'd rather stay here—I will really. I do love Hillside—it's only the sea I miss, and the fun, and—and the excitement when the boats come in—but I shall forget all about it soon, and I'll be happy here too, if you'd like to stay."

She did try to put aside her own feelings, and speak cheerfully, and she succeeded—but, to her surprise, her grandmother did not jump at her offer.

"No, child, I wouldn't rather stay. I'd like to go. I feel I want to be near my own, and your father and you are all I've got. I think I'll ask him if he can find a little house that'll suit us."

"Won't you live with us, granny? You can have my room."

But granny would not hear of that. "I've always had a home of my own, and I couldn't live in anybody else's," she said decisively. "Your stepmother's too much of an invalid herself too, to be able to look after another."

"Then you'd want me to live with you?" asked Mona, with a little break in her voice. She was disappointed, but she tried not to show it.

"Yes, dearie," her eyes scanning Mona's face wistfully, "wouldn't you like that?"

Mona hesitated for only a second, then "Yes, granny, I should," she said, and then as the idea became more familiar, she said more heartily, "Yes, I'd love to, and oh, granny, if we could only get one of the little houses down by the Quay it would be lovely! I'm sure you'd like it——"

"I couldn't live down by the Quay," granny interrupted sharply, "I wouldn't live there if a house was given me rent free. It is too noisy, for one thing, and you feel every breath of wind that blows."

"But you're close, when the boats come in——"

"Aye, and when they don't come in," said granny. "I ain't so fond of the sea as you are, and I should never know any rest of mind down close by it. Every time the wind blew I'd be terrified."

Mona looked vexed. "It isn't often that there's any place at all to let," she said crossly. "If we don't take what we can get, we shall never go at all."

But Granny Barnes was not alarmed. "Don't you trouble yourself about that. Your father'll find us something for certain. He'd got his eye on a little place when he was here, he wanted me to take it then. I almost wish I had, now. Never mind, I'll write to him to-night or to-morrow. If I was well I would go in by John Darbie's van and have a look about for myself."

All this sounded so much like business, that Mona sat up, all her glumness falling from her. When Granny Barnes once made up her mind to do a thing, she did not let the grass grow under her feet. There was, after all, much of Mona's nature in her, and when once she had made up her mind to leave her old home, it almost seemed as though she could not get away quickly enough.

Perhaps it was that she felt her courage might fail her if she gave herself much time to think about things. Perhaps she felt she could not face the pain and the worry if she gave herself time to worry much. Or, it may have been that she really did feel anxious about Mona's health and her own, and wanted to be settled in Seacombe as soon as possible.

At any rate she so managed that within a fortnight all her belongings were mounted on to two of Mr. Dodd's waggons and were carried off to the new home, while she and Mona followed in John Darbie's van, seen off by Mrs. Lane. Mrs. Lane was very tearful and sad at parting with them.

"I know it's for the best for both of you—but I feel as if I can't bear the sight nor the thought of the empty home." Then she kissed them both, and stood in the road in the sunshine, waving her hand to them till they were out of sight.

"Wave your handkerchief to her, Mona; blow another kiss to her, child." But granny kept her own head turned away, and her eyes fixed on the bit of white dusty road which lay ahead of them. Neither could she bear the sight of the empty house, nor of the neighbour she was leaving.

Mona's eyes were full of tears, but granny's were dry, though her sorrow was much deeper than Mona's. John Darbie tactfully kept his tongue............