"May Hetty come to see me sometimes?" asked Mrs. Kane, humbly curtseying
her good-bye, when her visitor was seated in her pony phaeton and
gathering up the reins for flight.

"Oh, certainly, as often as you please," answered Mrs. Rushton gaily,
and touching the ponies with her whip she was soon out of sight; while
poor Mrs. Kane retreated into her cottage to have a good motherly cry
over the tiny broken shoes and the little washed-out faded frocks which
were now all that remained to her of her foster-daughter.




CHAPTER V.

A LONELY CHILD.


Mrs. Rushton having adopted Hetty, set about extracting the utmost
amount of amusement possible from the presence of the child in her home.
She soon grew anxious to get away from her brother's "unpleasantly
sensible remarks," and Isabel's gentle excuses for her conduct, which
annoyed her even more, as they always suggested motives for her actions
which were far beyond her ken, and seemed far-fetched, over-strained,
and absurd. So she took the child to London, where she introduced her
to her friends as her latest plaything.

Hetty had frocks of all the colours of the rainbow, and learned to make
saucy speeches which entertained Mrs. Rushton's visitors.