By A. S. M. HUTCHINSON, 
Author of “ The Happy Warrior ” and “ the Lugger” 
Illustrated by A. Leete. 
I. 
HIS is the story of a fight. 
Beauty is in the eye of "the 
beholder ; and, similarly, a 
fight is either a dreadful fight 
or a magnificent fight accord- 
ing to the personal view of 
putting a quarrel to the 
arbitrament of seeing which of the parties can 
thump the other’s nose the harder or the 
longer. This particular fight may have been 
dreadful or may have been magnificent. It 
certainly was tremendous. It was fought at 
Fair Maid’s Cove, which is of red South 
Devon sand, and a mile along the shore from 
Merringlee ; and it was fought on an August 
afternoon, which was the occasion of Miss 
Milly Tenfold’s fourteenth birthday. 
Milly gave a picnic to the spot ; and 
announcing it to a cluster of her darling 
friends — describing the plans, the tea-making, 
the special cakes from Poirre’s, the peaches, 
the plums, the games, and the rest of the 
delights — ended with this rare and most 
attractive quality : “ And no boys ! ” The 
Copyright, 1913, by 
cluster of her darling friends greeted the 
announcement with rapture. They were of 
the ages at which boys are considered (and 
often are) detestable nuisances ; and that 
darling Milly’s picnic should be a girls’ picnic, 
unspoilt by rude, rough boys, was acclaimed 
with much clapping of pretty young hands, 
hopping on shapely young legs, and delighted 
unanimity in the large condemnation — 
“ Boys are beasts ! ” 
Poor girls ! This was a fortnight before 
the picnic. Within a week of the words, of 
the cries of approval, of the clappings and of 
the hoppings, Miss Milly was sharply informed 
that life is not roses, roses all the way — not, 
at least, for girls. Within a week the chiefest 
delight of her picnic was brutally shattered. 
Within a week one boy and within ten days 
two boys were plunged into her party — 
plumped by impious fate into the cluster of 
darling friends who alone were to have been 
her guests. 
This Milly Tenfold, it is as well to under- 
stand, was orphaned — orphaned and had her 
home now for five years with General Tenfold, 
A. S. M. Hutchinson. 
