Jock had not only opened the case, but had opened it upside down, and the classical performances of Armine and Barbara had powdered themselves and everything around, while the draught that was rushing through all the wide open doors and windows dispersed the mischief far and wide.

“Can you do nothing but laugh, Caroline?” gravely said Mrs. Brownlow.  “Janet, shut that window.  Children, out of the way!  If you were mine, I should send you to bed.”

“There’s no bed to be sent to,” muttered Jock, running round to give a sly puff to the white heap, diffusing a sprinkling of white powder over his aunt’s dress.

“Jock,” said his mother with real firmness and indignation in her voice, “that is not the way to behave.  Beg your aunt’s pardon this instant.”

And to everyone’s surprise the imp obeyed the hand she had laid on him, and muttered something like, “beg pardon,” though it made his face crimson.

His uncle exclaimed, “That’s right, my boy,” and his aunt said, with dignity, “Very well, we’ll say no more about it.”

Mary Ogilvie was in the meantime getting some of the powder back into the tin, and Janet running in from the kitchen with a maid, a soup tureen, and sundry spoons, everyone became busy in rescuing the remains-—in the midst of which there was a smash of glass.

“Jock again!” quoth Janet.

“Oh, mother!” called out Jock.  “It’s so long!  I thought I’d get the feather-brush to sweep it up with, and the other end of it has been and gone through this stupid lamp.”

“Things are not unapt to be and go through, where you are concerned, Mr. Jock, I suspect,” said Mr. Ogilvie.  “Suppose you were to come with me, and your brothers too, and be introduced to the swans on the lake at Belforest.”

The boys brightened up, the mother said, “Thank you most heartily, if they will not be a trouble,” and Babie put her hand entreatingly into the schoolmaster’s, and said, “Me too?”

“What, Venus herself!  I thought she had disappeared in the cloud!  Let her come, pray, Mrs. Brownlow.”

“I thought the children would have been with their cousins,” observed the aunt.

“So we were,” returned Armine; “but Johnnie and Joe ran away when they saw Mr. Ogilvie coming.”

Babie having by this time had a little black hat tied on, and as much arrowroot as possible brushed out of her frock; Carey warned the schoolmaster not to let himself be chattered to death, and he walked off with the three younger ones.

Caroline would have kept her friend, but Mary, seeing that little good could be gained by staying with her at present, replied that she would take the walk now, and return to her friend in a couple of hours’ time; and Carey was fain to consent, though with a very wistful look in her eyes.

At the end of that time, or more, Janet met the party at the garden gate.  “You are to go down to my uncle’s, children,” she said; “mother has one of her very bad headaches.”