The sun shone bright and beautiful this morning, there was no wind, and the streets were clear of snow, so Bobsie went for a ride in his new wheel-chair. What do you think he wore? The dearest little fur-lined overcoat, and a fur cap with a military cockade, almost the exact duplicate of those belonging to Georgie which I was mean enough to envy the last time he came to see us!

This is the way it happened. The wheel-chair did not come from Mrs. Burroughs Thursday evening as we had hoped. Robin kept watching for it, and listening for the bell. I waited, too, but all in vain. I don’t know which of us went to bed the more disappointed. The next day, Friday, it rained. Robin could not have gone out under any circumstances,—but it was not until late in the afternoon, after hours of waiting, that the chair finally arrived.

It was left at the basement door by Mrs. Burroughs’ maid with a big bundle and a little note. Mother read the note, while I undid the bundle, cutting all the strings, you may be sure, and wondering what it might contain. Inside the wrapping paper there was a dear little steamer rug;—such a pretty, serviceable plaid, and warm as warm can be. Then came the overcoat, the fur cap with close ear-laps, just such as they are wearing this winter, and a charming pair of fur-lined gloves! But,—could we accept so much?

“Listen, Bobs,” said mother, and read the note aloud:

Now was not that a lovely note?

“Will you take the things, Bobsie dear?” said mother.

“’Course I will,” answered Bobs with a sympathetic sniff. He had felt the sadness underlying the gentle words, and stood quite grave and serious as we tried on the coat and gloves. They fitted as if they had been made for him, and how charming our Robin looked!

“I’ll have to be very good when I wear these,” he remarked, quaintly:—but, alas, for resolutions!

As I said, we took our first walk this morning, and Robin was so comfortable in his new chair with the steamer rug tucked close about his little thin legs! The street was full of his “friends,” and Bobs beamed on them with gracious condescension. A pretty glow of excitement burned in his cheeks; his eyes were bright as stars; he did not look like a little invalid boy.

“People will think I am riding just because I am so Rich,” he remarked, looking down at his fur-lined gloves;—and that moment turning the corner of Washington Square, whom should we meet but Georgie and his nurse, out for a morning stroll, too.

“Hello!” says Georgie, his eyes nearly popping out of his head with amazement,—“Where’d you get those things?” For, naturally, he had never seen Bobs attired so gorgeously before.

“Boy gave ’em to me,” answered Robin, loftily.

“What boy?” questioned Georgie. And then before Robin had time to reply,—“Pooh! I wouldn’t take coats an’ things from anybody, ’cept just my papa. I’d be ashamed to wear other people’s clothes!”

“No, you wouldn’t! Not the way I do!” shouted Robin, with flashing eyes. “This coat belongs to an Angel, I’d like to have you know! And nobody’d let you wear it,—you’re too bad!”

“Robin! Robin!” I cried. “What would Francis think if he could hear you now?”

Robin instantly subsided; and, indeed, it was not necessary for him to say more. Georgie was quite quelled and done for. The idea of the Angel coat was more than he could grapple with. He walked along beside the chair in a state of wondering, but subdued, solemnity.

After a while he began timidly to stroke the fur on Robin’s cuff.

“Is it warm?” he asked.

“Yes, it is,” answered Robin, still a trifle defiant.

“Suppose you tell Georgie about the things,” I said,—for Robin was clever enough to appreciate that the impression he had created, though delightful to his vanity, was not strictly in accordance with fact.

“Well,” he muttered, unwillingly, “Francis is an angel now, and this was his coat. And I’m sick like he was, and good, too, and that’s why I needn’t be ashamed to wear it.”

“So long as you stay good,” I answered.

And Robin blushed and hung his head, while Georgie sighed. He did not entirely understand, even yet, but somehow the tension of his prosaic little mind was relieved.

Nevertheless, he was very respectful and polite to Robin all the rest of the walk, and the explanation must have set him thinking, I suppose, for this afternoon while Bobs was upstairs taking a nap, who should appear at our door but Georgie, this time under the care of William, the coloured butler.

“Here,” he said, handing me a square package, prettily done up with tissue paper and red ribbon. “This is for Bobbie, because he is sick. Tell him it’s the one with the picture of the tiger. He likes that best, but I like the Brownie Books.”

“Oh, thank you, Georgie dear,” I said, kissing his little ruddy face. “What made you think to bring it over?”

“I wanted him to have something to ’muse himself with,” said Georgie, “and mamma said I might, if only I would stop teasing.”

“It was very kind of you, honey,” I answered, and Georgie beamed.

Sometimes I am ready to admit that I am unjust to Georgie. It isn’t his fault that he has all the things I want for Robin, to be sure.

And now I must write something that I dread to put down in black and white;—but there is no use shirking. We have to face it. The Hancocks are going! The news came quite unexpectedly to us all, and it is nobody’s fault.

Mrs. Hancock saw mother this evening, and explained that Mr. Hancock’s married sister had come to the city and taken a furnished house, and it had always been understood between them that when this happened she and Mr. Hancock would rent a floor. She said she was really sorry to leave us, that she had no complaints to make; but they were anxious to be settled before Christmas, and felt obliged to give up their rooms next Saturday. That would give us a whole week in which to rent them, and she hoped we would have no trouble.

But, oh dear! we haven’t even had any applications for Mrs. Hudson’s room yet. It seems to be an unlucky season, or something, and when the Hancocks go, I don’t see how we are going to get on at all!

We will have only Miss Brown left, and she pays less than anybody else because her room is so small. Can a family of seven people live on ten dollars a week? That sounds like a problem in a Lady’s Magazine; but I fancy the answer will prove very different from those printed, if we are unlucky enough to have to try it.

“I have such a queer feeling whenever I look at Miss Brown,” confessed Ernie, as we put away the dinner dishes,—Rose having begged for an unexpected afternoon out. “Sort of as if we were a Cannibal family, and she was the last captive we had left. Just think, she means muttonchops, and beefsteak, and milk for Robin, and butter, and eggs, and everything except rent! We must guard her carefully, Elizabeth, and see to it that she does not escape!”

Poor Miss Brown! I had had somewhat the same feeling myself, though I would not have thought of expressing it in exactly Ernie’s words.

I think mother must have guessed from our faces how worried we were, for, as soon as the dishes were finished, she sat down at the piano and began to play the jolliest lot of college airs. And soon we were all singing and laughing; to hear us you wouldn’t have thought we had a care in the world. Certainly, for a time we forgot we had! Even Haze shut up his CÆsar, and joined in the frolic.

Now wasn’t that exactly like mother,—and no one but her?

“We’ll think it out together, Elizabeth,” she whispered, as I bade her good-night. “Don’t worry, dear.”