engaged in defending it from all comers, especially porters, and
making of it a comfort able seat for Miss Leaf.

"Nay, have patience, Selina. We will give him just five minutes more,
Hilary."

And Johanna sat down, with her sweet, calm, long suffering face
turned upward to that younger one, which was, as youth is apt to be,
hot, and worried, and angry. And so they waited till the terminus was
almost deserted, and the last cab had driven off, when, suddenly,
dashing up the station yard out of another, came Ascott.

He was so sorry, so very sorry, downright grieved, at having kept his
aunts waiting. But his watch was wrong--some fellows at dinner
detained him--the train was before its time surely. In fact, his
aunts never quite made out what the excuse was; but they looked into
his bright handsome face, and their wrath melted like clouds before
the sun. He was so gentlemanly, so well dressed--much better dressed
than even at Stowbury--and he seemed so unfeignedly glad to see them.
He handed them all into the cab--even Elizabeth. though whispering
meanwhile to his Aunt Hilary, "What on earth did you bring her for?"
and their was just going to leap on to the box himself, when he
stopped to ask "Where he should tell cabby to drive to?"

"Where to?" repeated his aunts in undisguised astonishment. They had
never thought of any thing but of being taken home at once by their
boy.

"You see," Ascott said, in a little confusion, "you wouldn't be
comfortable with me. A young fellow's lodgings are not like a house