“This is delightful!” Sydney cried, as she sat down beside the bright fire in the pretty bedroom near Katharine’s, which had been allotted to her at the Deanery. “It is quite too lovely of you to ask me, and it is quite too lovely of them to let me come! I never thought I should be allowed to, and Lady Frederica said ‘No’ at first, and I mustn’t go visiting because of not being ‘out’; but St. Quentin stood by me, and said everyone had holidays at Christmas-time, and I should go if I wanted. You can guess how much I did want; even now it seems too good to be true!”
“Well, I am very pleased to have you, dear,” Katharine said, smiling across at the girl, “though I wish it were for longer than two days. There is so much I want to hear. I miss the calisthenic class now that the............