The evening went off happily. Aunt Jane produced one of the old
games which had been played at the elder Beechcroft, and had a
certain historic character in the eyes of the young people. It was
one of those variations of the Game of the Goose that were once held
to be improving, and their mother had often told them how the family
had agreed to prove whether honesty is really the best policy, and
how it had been agreed that all should cheat as desperately as
possible, except 'honest Phyl,' who _couldn't_; and how, by some
extraordinary combination, good for their morals, she actually was
the winner. It was immensely interesting to see the identical much-
worn sheet of dilapidated pictures with the padlock, almost close to
the goal, sending the counter back almost to the beginning in search
of the key. Still more interesting was the imitation, "in very
wonderful drawing, devised by mamma, of the career of a true knight---
from pagedom upwards---in pale watery Prussian-blue armour, a crimson
scarf, vermilion plume, gamboge spurs, and very peculiar arms and
legs. But, as Valetta observed, it must have been much more
interesting to draw such things as that than stupid freehand lines
and twists with no sense at all in them.

Aunt Ada, being subject to asthmatic nights, never came down to
breakfast, and, indeed, it was at an hour that Gillian thought
fearfully early; but her Aunt Jane was used to making every hour of
the day available, and later rising would have prevented the two
children from being in time for the schools, to which they were to go
on the Monday. Some of Aunt Jane's many occupations on Saturday
consisted in arranging with the two heads of their respective
schools, and likewise for the mathematical class Gillian was to join
at the High School two mornings in the week, and for her lessons on
the organ, which were to be at St. Andrew's Church. Somehow Gillian