“’Ave you ’eard as Widow Collins’ lad be down from London, Mr. Barfield?” said a little spare woman who stood willingly patient before the counter of a small shop and watched the grocer’s deft fingers pack up a neighbour’s tea and sugar before attending to her own demands.

It was dark, for it was eventide, and the shop did not face the sunset that was going on brilliantly behind the pines at the top of the village street; but any one could have told from the tone of the voice that there was something more than common about Widow Collins’ lad.

Mr. Barfield lit an odoriferous paraffin lamp and hung it to a hook on the low ceiling, amid a wonderful collection of boots and hats and sunshades, of kettles and coils of rope and saucepans—and of Spanish onions on strings.

“What, he that’s clerk in the London Post Office?” asked the other customer with sudden interest.

“I never ’eard as she had no other, Mrs. Neave,” answered the first speaker half crossly, for she was not pleased that the grocer should give more attention to business than to her news; “and I s’pose its ’cause he’s the only one that she see’d fit to bring ’im up above ’is station.” The lamp lit up a thin, pinched face that had once been pretty with that frail, trivial prettiness that seems so strangely ill-fitted for the hard life of daily labour, where it is nevertheless so common. Mrs. Cave drew her ill-fitting little black jacket around her with an irritability of gesture that told in itself how perpetual struggles and over-fatigue had wrought on her. She had had no chance of bringing up any one of her seven boys above his station, for laundry work only brought in a fair pittance in the summer time, when the place was full of visitors, and Widow Collins had the monopoly of the all-the-year-round families.

“Ah, it’s a sad mistake to bring ’em up above their stations,” said Mrs. Neave piously, as she gathered up her purchases. “We’re sure to be punished for it in the long run, as Mrs. Collins is bound to be one o’ these days.” Mrs. Neave, being a plumber’s wife, considered herself just a cut above laundresses, and patronized them accordingly.

“Ah, how’s that?” asked Mr. Barfield, quite interested now, though he ran busily round to the other side of the shop at the same time to fetch a skein of yarn from his haberdashery counter for Mrs. Cave; “I thought the lad was doin’ well, though to be sure pride is sure to ’ave a fall.” As the prop and stay of the Dissenting Chapel round the corner, Mr. Barfield often felt it his duty to add a pinch of righteousness to his customers’ purchases to make up the weight, and Mrs. Neave, being the wife of a fellow-warden, required special attention in this particular.

But Mrs. Cave tossed her head; though she was no warden’s wife she needed no one to tell her how old Mrs. Collins was being punished, for, secretive as was that absent lady, the little laundress would have wormed the heart out of a stone. Manners, however, forbade that she should take the word out of a neighbour’s mouth, so she held her peace, though it was pain and grief to her, and let the plumber’s wife take up the tale again.

“Well, the lad have married a woman with money, to be sure,” continued that lady, sadly, almost as though she were grieved to have to allow the fact, "but they do say"—and from the tone of the voice it was to be supposed that Mrs. Neave knew of circumstances that would have mitigated the joys of that match, but she was not permitted to make them known.

The grocer himself interrupted her.

“So I did ’ear,” he said quickly, almost betraying a certain satisfaction of his own at being able to add his mite to the gossip, “in the fish-trade.”

“I know nothin’ about that,” began Mrs. Neave again, feebly peevish, but at this open avowal of incompetence Mrs. Cave could keep peace no longer. It was more than flesh and blood could stand, and she burst in scornfully.

“Fish-trade, indeed,” cried she. “Why, it’s a restaurant, and a smart one too, in some part o’ London they calls ’Igh ’Olborn. But though he did catch her with that ’andsome, softy face o’ his, she be that sort of a person she won’t look at ’is poor relations, and won’t so much as let ’im ask ’is own mother to ’is own ’ouse.”

Mrs. Cave looked triumphantly round for her effect, and she got it.

The plumber’s wife ejaculated,ejaculated, “Well, I never!” and was speechless, though whether her emotion resulted from horror at the younger Mrs. Collins’ arrogance, or from astonishment at Mrs. Cave’s audacity in taking the speech from off her very tongue was not clear; and Mr. Barfield made a strange little noise with his lips indicative of amazement and dismay, not unmixed with religious disapproval.

“And I should say it was more nor a year since he was even here to see her last,” said he sententiously. “And well I remember it must be fifteen year since she’s been alone to slave and toil for that boy.”

“Fifteen? Why, it be twenty,” cried the laundress. “And many’s the time I could swear she went without ’er dinner so as ’e should be schooled better than others. And shabby she’ll go to her dyin’ day—though one’d think she might take a bit of ’elp from ’im now as ’e’s got others to keep ’im, and she not so much as the bit o’ comfort o’ seein’ ’im now and again. But it be all ’er pride—it be pride as has kep’ ’er up all these years. Pride to ’ave ’im better than ’erself. And this is ’ow she’s served.”

There was an honest ring in Mrs. Cave’s indignation, and who was to tell—certainly not herself—that there was a spice of satisfaction in it as well?

“Poor soul!” murmured Mrs. Neave. “Though it do serve ’er right for settin’ up her horn as she do.”

“Well, there,” declared the grocer, returning to his usual cheeriness, “she’s got the satisfaction o’ seein’ him a gentleman. I suppose ’e’ll scarce pass the word to his old acquaintance as equals when ’e walks to church with ’er to-morrow mornin’. That ought to be a reward to any woman.”

“She’ll look us all in the face and no mistake to-morrow,” said Mrs. Cave, moving to the door, but even as she did so, envy and satisfaction were both merged in wonder pure and simple as she beheld striding down the village street in the dusk, the figure of a tall young man, bearing a large wicker basket under his arm.

“Well, I’m blest,” cried she, gasping, “if that ain’t—but, no, it never can be Johnnie Collins!”

Mrs. Neave was at her side in a moment, and Mr. Barfield sidled quickly from behind his counter and stood beside the two women at the door.

“Well, I never!” ejaculated Mrs. Neave again. “Why, he’s carrying his mother’s linen ’ome same as he used to do before he went to London!”

Mr. Barfield whistled, and they all three stood staring commiseratingly at the handsome youth, who quite unconcernedly swung along the road and disappeared down a bye-lane at the corner. “Well, I wouldn’t ha’ believed it not if you’d ha’ told me!” murmured Mrs. Cave. And at the same time, her eyes wandering to Mr. Barfield’s face, went past him down the hill, and saw Widow Collins herself toiling a little painfully up towards the shop from the sea. “Hush!” she whispered, dragging Mrs. Neave within again, “’ere she comes, I do declare!”

They all stood waiting, and the widow came on slowly, looking neither to right nor to left. She passed the shop, at first noting none of them, but then turned back and, merely giving a casual nod to Mrs. Neave as she brushed by her, walked straight in and up to the counter, whither Mr. Barfield had quickly retreated.

“A pound of Dutch cheese,” said she shortly, without preliminary greeting of any sort. “A nice fresh cut, please.”

She looked at the cheese and not at Mr. Barfield. She was a hard-featured woman—thin and tall, with sad keen eyes, wherein there was no gleam of the cheerfulness that some might have expected to see there because of that unwonted presence in her lonely home yonder.

“I ’ear you’ve your son ’ome, Mrs. Collins,” said Mr. Barfield, pleasantly, paring off the outer rind of the cheese as he spoke, for he knew the customers that he was forced to humour. “Married, ain’t he? Wife with him?”

“No,” answered the woman, shortly. “His wife is visitin’ her own folk.”

Mrs. Cave glanced at Mrs. Neave as who should say, “I told you so,” but the latter took it as a hint to proceed, and said quickly to the widow:

“Ah, but you’ll be goin’ up to London presently. That’ll be nicer for you than ’avin’ visitors at ’ome. She’s a well-to-do woman, ain’t she, your son’s wife? So she’ll ’ave time to leave her work a bit to show ye round the place.”

“Yes, she’s a rich woman,” answered the widow, looking the speaker in the face with that quiet self-satisfaction that was the special annoyance of the female portion of the village. “But if she ’ave got time to leave ’er work, I ’aven’t got time to leave mine. I’ve my customers to think of.”

Whether Mrs. Cave saw a covert taunt in this remark or not, it seemed somehow to goad her into speech.

“Well, anyways you must be rare and pleased to see your son just the same simple lad as ’e always was, now ’e could play the gentleman if he liked,” said she.

The remark should have seemed innocent enough, and what most mothers would have flushed with pride to hear, but Mrs. Cave was clever, and knew her prey.

The widow glanced at her sharply, uneasily, and laid her money down on the counter.

“Look alive, Mr. Barfield, please,” said she, “I’m late to-night.”

The slight was too great to be borne. Mrs. Cave moved to the doorway.

“Oh, you don’t need to ’urry,” said she, tartly. “’E be only just gone round the corner to the Parsonage with your basket o’ linen. ’E won’t be back just yet.”

A faint tremor ran through Mrs. Collins’ body even to the hand that she stretched out to take her parcel, but she said nothing, and to any observer less keen than the rival laundress, the tremor was but a shiver that was easily accounted for by the sea-fog that was slowly sweeping up across the marsh below.

“Well, I wish you joy o’ getting him back so well set up,” said Mr. Barfield, good-naturedly, as he tied the knot in the string. “It must do your ’eart good, I’m sure, to have him by to give you a ’and again when you ’ave to work for yourself all the year round.”

The widow looked at him, and in her eyes was a hardness that might well have chilled a braver man.

“Thank you,” she said coldly, “I don’t know as one day makes much odds.”

Mr. Barfield was silent, and so indeed was Mrs. Cave, but the plumber’s wife, blundering on, said patronizingly:

“There now, you oughtn’t to take it so ungrateful, and him so nice and obliging to you. There’s some lads ’ud be so stuck up with being raised up—why, they might think it beneath ’em to do such a job!”

Mrs. Cave smiled, and then laughed outright, and the old woman’s eyes grew harder than ever.

Mr. Barfield brought her change—two coppers and a threepenny-bit—and laid it on the counter before her. She took it up without a word, nodded good-night a trifle more surlily than usual, and without unlocking her set lips or turning her eyes once upon either of the two women, passed out into the dusk. Her face was as thunder.

“Well, ’pon my word, it ain’t no sort o’ use tryin’ to be civil and kindly to ’er,” sighed Mrs. Neave; but Mr. Barfield, who had seen the widow’s face, felt a vague sense of pity rise in his calculating little soul, and said as he stuck his pen briskly behind his ear after “entering” Mrs. Neave’s purchase:

“We can’t always just tell, ye know. She may be glad enough to get a sight of ’im though she do talk so short, and as like as not she never sent him round with the linen at all.”

Mrs. Cave was already in the road; she was watching the mother, who set her face once more to the sunset, and, whipped by the creeping mist, struggled on to the cross-roads, where a line of straight pine-stems stood black against the sky that flamed beyond the downs: the downs were blue with mist and the sky was red—red and angry—and the spare bent figure made a spot upon it, and that little spot was the blackest in the whole scene.

“No,” said Mrs. Cave decisively, to those within, “I shouldn’t think she did send him round with it! I should like to know what a body’d want to spend years toilin’ and moilin’ for, except to have the boy cut a bit of a figure when ’e come back among them as knowed ’im a little dirty brat! She sent him indeed!”

Mrs. Cave stuck her sharp little nose in the air, and Mrs. Neave retorted stoutly:

“Well, if she didn’t send ’im, I should say she’d be all the better pleased. I s’pose she’s fond o’ the lad arter her fashion, though, to be sure, she showed it a queer way when ’e was little. My boys do say ’e was that frightened of her there was times when they’d a job to get him to go ’ome.”

“And yet,” put in the grocer, “I can call to mind the day when he fell into the river down yonder. Some one ran up and told ’er of it, and didn’t know whether the child was alive or dead, and they do say she went down all of a ’eap like a corpse of lead. And the doctor told my wife she’s never been the same woman since. And yet when the neighbours brought ’im in drippin’’ wet and queer—if she mustn’t needs go rating ’im for it all the while she was a puttin’ ’im to bed. I know she spoke quite sharp to me when I went round at night to ask after ’im, and yet I could swear I ’eard her cryin’ over ’im soft and a kissin’ of ’im whiles he slept, as I stood waitin’ at the door.”

“She’s a curious piece of goods,” sighed Mrs. Neave, “for though it don’t scarce seem like truth, I can recollect I see’d her once bring him a jam-tart to ’s tea when ’e was spudding thistles one day down in the marsh, and if you’d believe it, she kissed ’im just as one of us might ha’ done, ’cos he looked so pleased.” Mrs. Neave glanced at Mrs. Cave as one expecting to be disbelieved, but that shrewder lady only just looked her over and then burst into a loud laugh.

“Lord,” said she, “ye don’t understand the likes of ’er, that be certain!” and with a hasty nod to the company she passed on quickly up the street.

The after-glow had faded from the sky behind the downs, and the sea-mist had ceased to hurry across the marsh towards them, but had crumbled and massed itself into mounds and ridges that hung or floated over the wide, brown plain beneath the village—warmed and illumined by the rays of the bright October moon that had risen red out of the sea. Upon the little public terrace overhanging the marsh-land, the village lads were gathered for their evening pipe; they sat grouped beneath the thatched roof of the pent-house, men and boys together, while outside, upon the paved walk, a few women lounged with babies, taking their leisure too after the day’s labour. Mrs. Cave came down among them; she had given the family its supper, and had put a goodly portion of it to bed, but she had left the washing-up to her eldest girl—for Mrs. Cave was sighing for more gossip upon the great event of the day, and here she knew that she should find it.

“Be my Jim ’ere?” cried she, as she approached, alluding to her husband, who was indeed very rarely anywhere else, unless it were at the public-house.

“Yes, o’ course he be! Let the man ’ave his leisure a bit,” grinned a slatternly girl. And for the moment Mrs. Cave seemed only too much inclined to obey her.

For within with the men it was Johnnie Collins again, and Mrs. Cave’s keen eyes had noticed a black figure standing just opposite in the shadow of the old gateway, that gave zest to the situation.

“He might as well ha’ brought ’is smart missus round for us to ’ave a look at,” said one, “but I s’pose we ain’t fit for such as ’im now-a-days.”

“Lord, it ain’t Johnnie’s fault,” said another for Johnnie, though sometimes envied for the odd shillings he used to earn as a lad, through lending his handsome face and figure to be an artist’s model—had yet ever been a favourite, for he had been the easiest, most good-natured comrade in the world, and could always be led anywhere by any one.

“No, there ain’t no beastly pride about Johnnie!” declared a third, “but they say as ’is missus leads ’im a smarter dance nor ever ’is ’ard old mother did, and won’t let ’im come nigh the old lady now, so as ’e has to get away on the sly.”

Mrs. Cave strained her eyes, for she saw the gaunt figure creep out of the shadow at these words and quietly climb the village street; it was the widow as she had thought. Yes, and positively—lounging slowly down towards her—was that very son of hers in his elegant suit of grey homespun. It was as good as a play. Mrs. Cave hurried softly down the steps by the terrace and warily followed Widow Collins up the road. Curiosity was certainly Mrs. Cave’s besetting sin.

“Why, mother,” said the young man softly, “where have you been? I just went round to the Vicarage with your basket of linen, and when I got in again you were gone. Who would ever have thought to find you a-gossiping! But, there, indeed it does my heart good to see you hob-nobbing with the neighbours, and not so lonesome as you might be.”

The old woman took no note of this that to her might have seemed a weird jest. She did not even smile, but she said quickly: “I’m sorry you went round with the linen, John. There weren’t no call. I’ve got used to doing it myself now, and I don’t like it meddled with.”

“Why, I always used to,” he began.

But she interrupted him sharply. “Never you mind what you used to do,” she said pettishly, as though half ashamed of herself. “You ain’t here all the year round, nor I don’t want you—and what I do every week you needn’t to do just for once.”

“What, are you going to blame me now for being up in London,” he began, nervously laughing, “when it was you drove me there first?”

“Blame you!” she cried, and then stopped. “There,” she said, “you let me be, that’s all I want. I’ll see to myself so long as I’m above ground.”

He opened his mouth to speak, but she laid a quick, trembling hand on his coat-sleeve.

“Ye used to have to mind me,” she said, and her voice shook a little, “for, Lord knows, I was a bit ’ard with you o’ times! Ye’ve got to do other’s bidding now, and I’m glad on it. But ye’ll mind your mother to-day for the last time.”

Mrs. Cave, as she played eavesdropper, involuntarily thought of the day when her neighbour had seen the widow give a jam-tart to the lad on the sly, and she looked for her to kiss him now as she had kissed him then. But the old woman’s keen ear had caught the sound of the step behind her, and though the young fellow stooped towards her impulsively she pushed him back.

“Come,” she whispered, “let’s get ’ome to supper,” and she tried to hurry up the road, but not before Mrs. Cave had placed herself abreast of them, and holding out a friendly hand to Johnnie, had said effusively: “There, now, I thought it were Mr. Collins! But, ’pon my word, it be so long since we’ve seen you ’ere, there ain’t no knowing you again. And you so smart, too! Why, you’ll scare care to shake hands with a poor body like me.”

They all three stopped, and Johnnie blushed as he took her hand, perhaps with shame or perhaps with annoyance, knowing that the woman must have overheard his mother’s foregoing words—but the mother’s own face was as iron.

Mrs. Cave walked graciously on beside them, but the widow never glanced at her nor took any heed of her, but presently just stopped short in the road, and, hastily producing from her pocket the yellow envelope of a telegram, said quickly to her son: “There, I declare, I’d clean forgot! And I come down here on purpose to find ye too! The post-mistress brought this ’ere for ye.” And she held it out to him as she spoke.

The young man’s face fell a little, and he held the document in his hand as though fearing to open it.

He had stopped walking, and Mrs. Cave stopped too, and as neither mother nor son spoke she said pleasantly to the former: “Well, now I ’ope there’s no ill news to spoil your treat for you, Mrs. Collins, for I’m sure you’ll be proud to show him off to us all to-morrow o’ church time, and small blame to you. Though to be sure,” added she, turning to the young man, while the battered bow in her well-worn bonnet positively wagged with her eagerness, “ye might ha’ brought your wife with ye to see your old friends! For all folk do say she’s a lady born and bred, and it stands to reason we ain’t good enough for such as that.”

Mrs. Cave smiled, and Mrs. Collins’ face wore a mingled expression of pride and scorn, as she listened. She had forgotten the telegram; she lifted her head royally, gazing with satisfaction in her weary eyes at this handsome son of hers who was outwardly so like a gentleman that she might well be excused for thinking that folk really supposed him to be one. She thought he was one, and little guessed that she had blindly done her best to crush out of him those natural qualities of devotion and tenderness that were really the most like to what she desired him to be. If she had been angry with him for compromising his dignity, it was just because she was proud of him. She was proud even of his condescension to her. Yes, she was proud in secret to-night, but to-morrow she would be proud openly—before them all. It would be a triumph that would more than repay her for many patient years.

But Johnnie had opened the telegram. His face had changed; one could see it even in the shifting light of conflicting moon and twilight. There had been some sort of assurance in it before, and it had been gay and smiling; now it was tremulous, ashamed, and frightened.

He took out his watch, and the joyful pride faded out of the old woman’s face as she saw him do it.

“When’s the last train to Seacombe?” said he.

“Half-past nine,” answered Mrs. Cave, for the mother seemed suddenly to have lost the power of speech. “But whatever do you want to know that for?”

Johnnie turned to his mother. There was a sort of shame-faced humility in his attitude that belied an attempted swagger in his speech. “I shall have to go into Seacombe to-night, mother,” said he. “It’s very important. It’s—well, it’s business, you see, and a man must think of that first of all.”

“Lawk-a-mercy!” cried Mrs. Cave. “And you scarce ’ere a few hours! Why, there ain’t no business to do on a Saturday night, man! And you’ll never get a train back in time for church in the morning. You’d never disappoint your mother of that?”

But the old woman had recovered her composure now, and answered him.

“Business be always first,” said she, “to them as wants to get on in the world; and it wouldn’t be a mother as’d want her son to miss it. Come, John, there’ll just be time to get your supper afore ye go.”

The two went up the street together, and Mrs. Cave stood staring after them. Then she went back to the “Look-out,” and gave the benefit of her investigations to the village.

“It be my belief as that message were from ’is wife,” cried she. “It be my belief she was cross at ’im coming ’ere, and wasn’t going to let him stay a minute longer. And, Lord, any one might know he’d never dare say a masterful woman nay—be it wife or be it mother! Well, it serves the old soul right. She brought ’im up above ’is station, and she druv ’im and druv ’im all the time ’e was young, and, ’pon my word, ’e be just like a poor sheep as don’t know which way to run if there ain’t some one behind ’im with a stick.”

“Yet there’s good in the lad, I do believe,” said the grocer, who had just honoured the terrace for a few moments with his presence on his way home from the shop; “and one can’t choose but be sorry for the woman, for she’s worked ’ard for ’im.”

“Lor’ bless ye, she don’t mind,” laughed Mrs. Cave. “She’d rather ’ave ’im druv—though it be away from ’er—than not see ’im keep the ’igh road. She knows well enough as some one ’ave got to drive ’im. But we sha’n’t see Mrs. Collins at chapel to-morrow mornin’.”

In the latter part of her surmise Mrs. Cave was not correct. Mrs. Collins appeared at chapel, sternly neat in her rusty black, and was more gracious than she had ever been known to be before. As the little congregation poured out into the mellow autumn sunshine, where the birches were silver and yellow against the blue sky, and against the purple downs, and where the creepers lay crimson upon the grey walls of the cottages, a burly old farmer came up to her when she was returning Mrs. Cave’s commiserating greeting. “Why, Mrs. Collins, that son o’ your’s ’ave grown a smart young man, and no mistake,” said he. “I seen ’im get out o’ the train last night at Seacombe. There was a lady come to meet ’im. A fine dressed-up lady she were too, as might ha’ held up ’er ’ead with the best. It was ’is wife, as I made out. Lucy he called her.”

Mrs. Cave, who had pressed up to hear, shot a hasty glance at Mr. Barfield, and nodded her head.

But the widow did not notice it. Her eyes were far away on the dancing sea that shone so blue beyond the mile of yellow marsh where the street opened at the turn down the hill; she dropped the heavy lids over the triumph that was in them, but a flush crept to her sunken cheek, and she pressed her thin lips together as though to crush the smile that she knew hovered around them.

“Yes,” she said, demurely, “Lucy be the name of my son’s wife.”

“Well, and a handsome couple they make, then,” declared the farmer, “and well-to-do, too, as it seems. They druv off in a ’ired fly, they did. They’ll be driving over here next and driving you off along wi’ ’em.”

Again Mrs. Collins closed her lips over a smile. “I’m too old for strange places,” said she quietly.

“Well, well,” said the farmer, “you’ve a son to be proud of anyways. He’s done well for himself.”

Then Mrs. Collins lifted her eyes. “He ’ave done what I meant ’im to do,” she said slowly, “and I am proud of him.”

She stood a moment looking round upon them all one after another, as though tasting her triumph. Then she shook hands with the farmer, nodded to the rest, and went away slowly to her lonely cottage against the downs.

The farmer smiled rather foolishly, looking after her. He knew the widow but little. “Rather a queer sort of a body, ain’t she?” said he questioningly.

“Aye, sir, that she be indeed,” put in Mrs. Cave, the ever-ready. “If you’d believe it, she’d sooner never ’ave seed that son of hers again than ’ave ’ad ’im marry a girl of his own station as wouldn’t have took ’im away from ’er to make a gentleman of ’im. There’s pride for ye!”

The farmer looked surprised, but the grocer—approaching at that moment, fresh from his responsible Sunday duties in his irreproachable black clothes—put in his word cheerily.

“Oh,” said he, “the women make him out too bad. ’E’s not a bad sort. ’E’ll be sure to come back and see her again.”

And after that the congregation dispersed to their homes.

But though Johnnie Collins was not a bad sort, though he often begged his mother in a vague sort of way to come up to London and see him, and showed nothing but disappointment when she persistently refused, something always happened at the last moment to prevent him from coming down to see her.

He often wrote to her and often, too, sent her little sums of money, which the post-mistress declared she always cashed with a very sour face; and once his letter said that he intended to come and bring his little son to see grandmother. But “business” as usual intervened, and the little lad was sent down at last with a maidservant—the fresh air being considered beneficial for him after some childish ailment. Then it was that the old tree might have been said, as it were, to bloom afresh. All the tenderness that out of a Spartan pursuit of a distinct and difficult object had been withheld from her own boy’s childhood was lavished upon this little flower of her strange ambition.

Mrs. Cave and Mrs. Neave and Mr. Barfield all had tales to tell of this secret but undoubted transformation. The fair-haired babe and his stern grandmother were seen wandering along the lanes hand in hand as the twilight fell upon the day’s work, or when the August moon rose at the sun-setting—gold upon the golden harvest land. He was seen teazing her at the wash-tub, she patiently submitting, and she was even known beyond a doubt to have caught him in her arms in the open churchyard where the whole village might have seen her, and to have kissed him there to her heart’s content.

And even when that glad three weeks was over, and the boy went back to his parents, there were those who declared that the light never faded again from the old woman’s eyes till she was laid in the grave not two months afterwards.

Some one found her dead one day beside her own lonely fireside. In her hand was a letter from her son; it contained a £5 note, and said he wished it could have been more, but that they had an establishment to keep up now and their expenses were heavy.

Mrs. Neave was shocked, but Mrs. Cave declared that Johnnie had fulfilled all that his mother required of him, and that if she could but have known that he walked behind her coffin in a well-brushed suit of black broad-cloth, it would have added the last touch to her perfect satisfaction.

Be that as it may, and though the neighbours pitied her, there was a peaceful and a triumphant smile on the dead, old face.

The postman came swinging down the village street. It was morning, but the street was already astir, for though it was but early spring, and the apple-blossom was not yet out, the weather was warm, and those who found spare moments managed to get to the cottage doors and look out upon the sunshine.

At the corner the mill-wheel was going round, and upon the bridge that spanned the stream a knot of girls had gathered, with whom the miller’s son and a young farmer on his way to the early train were holding merry converse.

The postman came past. He bore the character of a surly fellow, though he was young yet, and should have been too well-mannered not to throw a civil word to a pretty girl. But some said he had been disappointed in love, and had sworn never to look at woman more.

“What, never a letter for me?” cried the foremost of the girls, planting herself full in his path as he went by. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re a postman for, Mr. Frewin, for it don’t seem to me as if ye ever had nothing to carry!”

She planted her arms akimbo and laughed in his face, her own a blaze of sweet merriment, too pretty to be bold, and too frank and sincere to be anything but captivating.

But Ben Frewin neither answered nor looked up, and the girl drew back baffled, but no wit discomposed, as he strode past her.

“Not a bit of it, ye’ll never do it, Letty,” laughed another of the girls, and the young farmer lit his pipe with a merry twinkle in his eye.

“Well, I shouldn’t like to say as Miss Letty couldn’t do any blessed thing as she pleased,” declared he gallantly, “but I’m bound to allow, it don’t look likely so far.” And he nodded to them all round as he went on his way to the station.

“What don’t look like it?” asked the young miller, coming out of the mill with his whitened face. He had not heard the last passage of arms.

“’Ere’s Letty Cox swears she’ll get Mr. Frewin to be her beau for a Sunday evening,” laughed one of the girls, nudging her friend good-humouredly.

The miller looked at Letty sharply; then he smiled.

“Bob Frewin ’ain’t been seen walking with a young ’ooman since Bett throwed him over,” said he.

“Well that ain’t no reason,” smiled Letty with a little pout, and a killing glance from under the black fringes of her soft grey eyes.

The miller answered it as it became him to do, and the girl who had spoken before giggled: “Lor, ain’t she just a bit set up?” said she.

But the miller did not seem to mind.

“Ye promised to walk with me next Sunday though,” said he persuasively.

“There’s no tellin’ what I might be wantin’ to do next Sunday,” said she. “It might be rainin’ for aught we know.”

“It might,” allowed he. “But again it mightn’t, and if it don’t—well, ye promised.”

“Did I then?” repeated Letty innocently. “Well, there’s other Sundays, and I bet Mr. Frewin shall walk with me one on ’em.”

“Done with you for a pair o’ gloves,” cried the miller, laughing, “for I bet he won’t!” And Letty flushed and demurred, for such a precise arrangement as this had not occurred to her; but the girls were delighted and wouldn’t let her refuse.

“They’ll be sure to be a nice pair, Letty,” whispered they. And Letty thought so too, and since she was so very, very sure to succeed, it seemed a pity to forego both the gift and the glory of winning it.

“All right then,” said she at last, blushing still and smiling; “when ’ave it got to be?”

“Sunday come three weeks,” declared he; but the other girls meant to see fair play, and vowed that this was far, very far from it.

“Well, if a woman can’t make a fool of a man in three weeks, she ain’t goin’ to do it at all,” answered he. “Ye did for me in one!”

There was a roar at this, and at that very moment the cause of all this commotion strode back again down the road passing the bridge by on the left this time, with his bundle of sorted letters in his right hand and his bag slung in front of him. He might very well have heard the miller’s last words, for they had been spoken in a loud voice, but his face was inscrutable, though the scowl upon it had deepened momentarily.

“Well,” added the miller, as he watched him pass, “I’ll grant ye you’ve a tough job, so we’ll say Sunday come four weeks. That’ll throw ye in Bank ’Oliday, and I’m sure that ought to count double.”

The girls giggled afresh as the miller went indoors.

“My, what a lark, Letty,” said one. “I wish it was me. My best gloves ain’t fit to be seen. But I don’t suppose ye’ll get ’em.”

And then they all parted and ran off to their various jobs, and left Letty, with the only one who lived up her way, to climb the village street to the old farm.

“I wish now as I ’adn’t done it,” sighed the girl half seriously.

But the other rallied and encouraged her, envying her secretly between whiles.

The farm stood above the village, on a common that was breezy when the valley lay languid in the heat; cherry and plum-trees were a-bloom in the orchard, and daffodils along the sides of the straight brick-paved walk that led from the gate to the old-fashioned porch.

As Letty stood in that porch the very self-same evening drying her plump brown arms on a cloth after washing up the tea-things, the postman stopped at the gate and began looking through the letters in his left hand.

The girl hung down her head and blushed; she was resolved, but she had not thought she would have to begin so soon; she was not ready.

As it so happened she could not have opened her campaign more neatly. He had always set her down as a bit of a bold-faced hussy, and had never looked at her properly, but with her eyes cast down, and her fresh cheek flushed with a modest pink, he was fain to take a good stare at her, waiting for her to come down to the gate and take the letter as usual.

But somehow she did not come, and he was forced to go up the garden walk to the porch.

“I’ve got something for ye at last,” said he stiffly as she did not speak. “I ’ope it’ll be good news.” And he handed the letter.

Still she did not look up; her courage had all forsaken her.

“Shall I lay it down ’ere?” said he, pointing to the window-sill.

“Yes, do,” answered she, “my ’ands is wet;” and then she stole a glance at him and he felt the softness of her grey eyes flash suddenly into his.

She lowered hers again at once, but the first shot in the war had been most successfully fired, although she did not guess it.

He blushed.

“Good evening to you,” said he hastily.

And he strode down the path again and swung to the latch-gate with a jerk.

Again Letty was sorry that she had made that silly wager.

The days passed by, and the postman had not come again to the farm with a letter, neither would the now unwilling besieger of his heart have found an opportunity of addressing him again, even had she desired to do so.

He kept himself aloof, and not all the chaff of more envious companions, nor the merry persuasion of her clever friends, could induce the girl to accost him as she had so frankly done before she had undertaken to win him.

The miller’s Sunday came round. In fresh shirt-front and well-brushed hat he turned up, as arranged, to take her for the promised walk.

“It’s goin’ to rain,” said Letty, “the clouds is awful black.”

“We won’t go far,” answered the young man, “and I can ’old the umbrella over your ’at and feathers if it should come down a bit.”

So Letty went, but it was against her will, though she couldn’t have told you why, for the miller was a likely man for a husband, seeing that he was as handsome a fellow as any in the village, and had about the best prospects. She laughed and chatted and chaffed, however, as was her wont, and how was the postman to know, when they met him presently going soberly to evening church with his old mother, that she was not quite so merry for the rest of the way, and went home quite half-an-hour earlier than she had intended?

But that might have been because the rain came down as she had prophesied, and she had supper to get at home, and could not risk being late by staying at the mill till the storm was over, as the miller’s mother had begged her to do.

Nevertheless her skirt was drenched when she got to the top of the hill. Perhaps it was a fellow feeling in the matter of having one’s Sunday best spoilt that made her take her courage in both hands and accost the postman when she met him again, just at her own door, walking without any protection against the weather in his black broad-cloth and tall hat.

“Won’t ye take the loan o’ my umbrella, Mr. Frewin?” said she timidly. “It’s comin’ down wonderful hard.”

Ben Frewin stopped, and as luck would have it, looked at her.

Her eyes were wistful, and there was a bashful sort of appeal in them that he had never seen there before. He could not account for it, but she might have done so; that is to say, she might have done so if she had been in the habit of analyzing her feelings. As it was, she did not know that shame for what she had undertaken was at the bottom of the sudden fit of apologetic coyness that made her so doubly and unconsciously fascinating.

From any one else, and still more from her at any other moment, Frewin would curtly have refused the offered civility. But she looked so timid and so anxious, standing there in the rain with her skirts gathered round her, and the umbrella half held out towards him, that he hadn’t the courage to snub her.

“Well, it’s real kind of you,” said he. “But ye’ll have to run indoors first, or ye’ll spoil yer pretty ’at.”

She turned and tripped up the path, and he must needs of course follow, the gate slamming to behind him. At the porch she closed the umbrella and held it out to him, but a voice from within called out authoritatively:

“Whatever don’t ye ask Mr. Frewin to step indoors for, Letty? Ye’ll both get wet to the skin out there.”

“Please won’t ye come in?” repeated the girl obediently. “Mother and me ’ll be very pleased.” And of course she had to lift those grey eyes up to his again, and though he had sworn that he would never cross glance with theirs more, yet he found his gaze entangled afresh, and for an instant did not remove it. Then his senses awoke to their danger, and he donned his armour again hastily.

“Thank ye,” said he almost roughly, “I won’t come in now, if you please. And there ain’t no call to trouble ye for the humbrella neither. The rain’s a’most over.”

She was looking out into the garden, and would not see that disputed article which he was holding out towards her.

“Oh no,” declared she. “It’s pourin’ still. Mother won’t be pleased if ye don’t step in for five minutes.”

But he was on his guard now, and obdurate.

“Not to-night,” said he shortly. And he placed the umbrella beside her against the lintel of the door. “Men ain’t afraid of a drop o’ rain, ye know, same as a girl’d be for sake of ’er smart clothes. It’s lucky for you it didn’t come on so ’ard when you was out a-walking with Mr. Lambert.”

Mr. Lambert was the young miller, and at any other time Letty would have tittered delighted at this covert proof of jealousy. But to-night she was half-hurt and half-frightened at it, and shrank back into herself.

“As you please,” answered she, pouting a little. And when he had gone, and she went in to get the tea, she was quite cross at being scolded for not having made him come in, and cross again with her friend who ran over from her home opposite when the storm was past, and congratulated her upon having got that far towards the winning of her bet.

“I don’t want to win no bet,” declared she. “He’s a uncivil sort of a chap, and I don’t know as I cares to ’ave nothink to do with ’im. And what’s more, I don’t think as bettin’s nice for girls, and I don’t know as I shall go on with it.”

“Well, whatever did ye do it for then?” cried the other.

“Because ye was all a-worryin’ of me on, I suppose,” retorted Letty, with a sharpness very unlike her usual merry and good-humoured self.

“Ye didn’t ought to go for a thing and not stick to it,” said her friend, vexed to see such a good piece of fun fall flat. “But there, ye’ll do it yet. Ye never was one to cry ‘’Ware!’ There’s no ’arm in it. It’s only for a bit of a lark, and he’s fair sport, he’s such a mooney, thinkin’ as he can walk through without seein’ us. I like his cheek.”

“Well, there’s no tellin’ what I may do and what I mayn’t do,” said Letty, tossing her head, and in that she was perfectly right, and many had said it of her before.

“The gloves’ll be beauties, that I’ll take my oath of,” said the girl encouragingly as she went.

Nevertheless time passed, and nothing of great moment occurred in this interesting duel that so many were eagerly watching, while one at least of the combatants was unaware of being engaged in it.

One day, coming home from the next station where she had been to see a married sister, Letty found herself alone in the same carriage with Bob Frewin, who had had occasion to go to the town hard by. And though no one could exactly accuse him of an on-coming disposition, any one who had seen him would have allowed that the postman was more friendly than he had been to a girl for many a long day. Letty had noticed it herself, and though piqued by his manner on that wet Sunday, she had begun with her proudest and most off-hand mood—the mood that always “fetched” the men, but which, to do her justice, she would not have dreamed of intentionally trying on such a tough customer—she lapsed into her apologetic and gentle manner long before the journey was over. And when they reached their destination, and Letty, in shame-faced distress, found that she had dropped her return ticket, and must pay the fare over again, it was not Frewin’s loan that she would accept to replenish her empty purse. As it so happened, Mr. Lambert was there, going off to London, and it was his shilling that Letty chose to take, declaring that as he lived close by, she could the more easily repay it.

It was what the men called a woman’s excuse that didn’t bear sifting, and it naturally had the effect of sending Frewin off with a flea in his ear and a sour face, so that the miller very cheerfully declared to Letty in confidence, that he didn’t see any call to buy the gloves in readiness, as he had intended to do that very day.

Things, in fact, were not going at all hopefully for Letty’s wager, which was perhaps the reason why she was going about with a more serious expression than her careless beauty had ever worn before, and why she never appeared on the bridge of an evening now, and even went past knots of her old comrades in the village with a hasty nod or such a conscious bit of chaff as might have betrayed to any one her unusual state of mind.

Bank Holiday loomed in the near distance without the wager being any nearer the winning than three weeks ago. And if it had not been for an unforeseen incident perhaps it would never have been won at all. But won it was, and this was how it came about.

It was a bright, clear spring morning. A keen east wind was blowing the cherry-blossom about, and the narcissus and daffodils along the cottage path swayed beneath it; but the sun was shining, and it was a good drying day, so Letty had just set to at the week’s washing, and was standing with her arms white in suds, when she saw Frewin open the gate and come slowly—very slowly—up to the door. She dried her hands and went to open it.

He held out a black-edged letter towards her.

“I’m sure I ’ope it ain’t bad news,” said he sadly.

She took it with a frightened face, still drying her hands mechanically. He turned his back, preparing to depart; yet he waited until she had opened it.

A little low ripple of laughter broke from her.

“Well, I suppose I ought to be ashamed to laugh,” said she. “But, Lor’, it give me such a fright I can’t ’elp but be pleased. Ye see, my brother’s away at sea, and it do give ye a turn when ye get a thing like this. But it’s only to say as old Aunt Porter’s gone, and she’s been bedridden and childish this ten years, and I ’aven’t seed her for twenty! Mother’d say it weren’t seemly of me not to take on, but, truth to tell, I’m so pleased it ain’t Jim, I can’t seem to mind much.”

“O’ course not,” assented the postman. "Old folks is bound to go,"—and he sighed—“and when they’s lost their wits and their limbs ’tis but a ’appy release, as the saying is. Well, I’m glad it ain’t nothink wrong with yer brother,” he said as he turned to go. But he said it sadly, and sighed again.

Letty put the letter in her pocket, and lifted her eyes to his with their sweetest, kindest look.

“It’s very friendly o’ you to mind whether the news was good or bad,” said she with a little laugh. “I’m sure it ain’t many as’d care a rap. Do you mind all the black-edged letters as ye give round now?”

There was just a thought of roguishness in the smile, and just a suspicion of the old coquettish air in the tilt of the dainty face; but it must only have been from habit, for the pretty grey eyes were a little dewy still, and the voice had none of the usual raillery in its tone.

But Frewin did not answer her question, and his quiet young face was still sad and preoccupied as he said:

“I’m in trouble myself to-day. I’d be sorry to bring the same to anybody.”

Her expression changed at once; every trace of coquetry was wiped out of it in a twinkling. She came a step nearer to him.

“In trouble!” echoed she. “Now I am sorry. But p’r’aps ye wouldn’t care to tell, me being but a stranger, so to speak.”

“I don’t know as you’re so much a stranger,” he began, and then he broke off. “I ha’n’t got nobody but mother,” he added in a moment, irrelevantly.

“What, she ain’t sick?” cried the girl quickly, with real feeling in her voice.

“Got to go to the ’orspital,” answered Frewin shortly. “It’s her eyes. They say as she’ll be stone blind if she don’t ’ave su’thing done immediate. They say as it’d be coward-like o’ me not to persuade her to it, for it’s sarten-sure to be all right; but, Lor’, I ain’t got no faith in doctors.”

Letty was silent—most likely she shared his opinion, and could find nothing consolatory to say, but her pretty face was full of sympathy. He allowed himself one piece of comfort; he looked at it. Their eyes met, and hers filled with tears; but not before she had poured something into his that was not only sympathy.

“Good-day,” said he quickly, and in another minute he was hurrying down the road.

But the wager was won, though the village little guessed it, and though Letty gave that part of the matter never a thought just then—never a thought till Bank Holiday came and went without her having so much as a bit of a swain for the day—never a thought till the girls came up and laughed at her, and pitied her for having spent it sitting alone in the chimney-corner.

Then she thought of it, but not as they imagined. She did not tell them that she might have had the handsome miller for a “walking-stick” without any trouble at all—that he had laughingly declared he was in luck’s way, since he was like to keep the gloves and get her company as well, upon which she had tossed her head with all those old airs of supremacy which so forsook her in her intercourse with Bob Frewin, and told him that he might keep the gloves and welcome, but that her company he should never have again; she did not tell them that she might have been winning her wager that very afternoon, but that the young postman had been obliged to use this one day off duty to take his mother up to the hospital; she did not tell them, because she was doing her very best to forget she had ever made that wager at all.

But she was destined to win it for all that. The operation on the old woman’s eyes passed off most successfully, and every morning and every evening as Bob Frewin strode up and down the village street, with his post-bag swinging in front of him, and his sorted bundle of letters in his left hand, Letty managed to be somewhere about in the garden or the porch just to hear the last news of the invalid.

When Saturday evening came, the weather, that had been wet all the week, cleared up for a fine Sunday; it was the very last Sunday that was left to win the wager in, but it was not on that account that Letty’s heart beat as she saw Frewin stop at the wicket, and not seeing her in the front garden, fumble a minute at the latch, and come half reluctantly up to the porch.

She was glad that she was in the orchard beside the house, taking down the linen that she had hung out in the morning to dry—for the big apple-tree, that was pink with budding bloom, sheltered her, and from behind the sheet that she was just going to unfasten from the line she could watch him unseen.

But she wondered whether her mother would say where she was, and she just edged a little further beyond her ambuscade as she saw him turn away from the door.

Her heart beat, but—yes, mother had told, or else he had seen her, for he came towards her through the side wicket.

Then she came forward, and her smile was so tremulous, and her cheeks so blushing, that he seemed to forget all his stand-offishness and any cause of offence that he might have, and to take heart of grace from her bashfulness.

“Ye are busy,” said he, “but I won’t keep ye long. Mother’s getting on first-rate, and the Sister has writ me a line for her. There’s a message for you in it.”

The grey eyes went up to his.

“I do call that kind,” said she. “What is it?”

It was the young man who blushed now.

“It’s a foolish message,” said he with a little laugh. “But mothers are that way. Anyway it don’t seem fair not to give it ye.”

“Oh, never mind,” faltered the girl, for there was a misgiving at her heart. But he had taken the letter out of his pocket.

“Tell Letty Cox,” he said, “as I thank her for her kindness to my lad in his trouble.”

“Kindness!” repeated she tremulously, and with downcast face.

“Well, when a feller’s a bit down, miss, ye wouldn’t think how it sort o’ cheers ’im up to ’ave somebody ’pear to care. It’s not many thinks of an old woman, but mother’s all the world to me.”

“O’ course she is,” murmured Letty.

“Leastways,” added the postman, rather darkly, “I didn’t think as I should ever think of another female but ’er again.”

“No,” said Letty softly.

“But there’s never no tellin’ what folks’ll do—man nor woman,” added Frewin wisely.

“No,” said Letty again.

And then there was a pause, during which she unfixed another white sheet from against the gentle blue of the evening sky.

“You’ll excuse me if I’m too free, miss,” said Frewin presently. “But you see—well, there, it was talk o’ the village, so ye must ’ave ’eard it with the rest! I was fooled once, and that’s the truth, and I don’t mean to be fooled again.”

There was no answer, and Letty’s face was somehow hidden behind the blushing blossom of a low branch of the apple-tree.

“So p’r’aps you’d excuse me,” he repeated, “if I was to ask you, as a plain man, whether you was a-walkin’ with Lambert o’ Bank ’Oliday when I was in town?”

The face emerged from behind its leafy screen, and was no longer tremulous but haughty.

“Well, it is a queer question,” said she, “and no mistake! But,” she added quickly, seeing him turn away,—“well, there, I don’t mind answering: Mr. Lambert asked me, but I didn’t fancy ’im. I sat alone all day.”

And it may have been the shame of such a confession from an acknowledged village belle that called the blush again to her cheek.

“Ye don’t say so, now,” declared the man, pleased. “Ye see, ye took Lambert’s loan as against mine the other day at the station, and, one thing and another—well, there—a man ain’t goin’ to be fooled twice, you bet.”

At the last word she hung her head lower than ever, and there was another pause.

At last he said, sheepishly now: “But I don’t s’pose ye would walk with me next Sunday. Though it seems clearin’ up for a nice day.”

He waited for an answer, but none came. Only after a minute or so a little sound as of stifled sobbing came from behind the white screen.

“Lor, whatever is the matter?” cried Frewin aghast. “Is it me that’s upset ye, my dear? There, ye don’t need to come if ye don’t want to. Any girl can say a feller nay. There’s no ’arm done yet.”

But still she cried on.

“I’d come right enough,” faltered she at last, between the sobs. “But—but there is ’arm done.”

And then suddenly she dried her eyes, and looked up at him with frank, fearless gaze.

“Your mother said as I’d been kind to ye, Mr. Frewin,” said she. “But I ’ain’t been—for I’ve behaved bad to ye. Yes, I ’ave. And ye said as you weren’t goin’ to be fooled again. And—and I like ye too well to fool ye, and that’s truth. And—and so I’d rather tell ye as I ’ave fooled ye already.”

His face went white, and he stared at her.

“Fooled me!” echoed he. “Not a bit of it!”

“Yes, I ’ave,” insisted she doggedly. “The girls said ye was a rude, surly chap as wouldn’t throw a word to any of us, and I swore I’d make you. And then Charlie Lambert dared me to, and wagered me a pair o’ gloves it’d be no go. It was just a lark,” said she half defiantly, but then added, with a tell-tale throb of the voice, “though you can’t say as I’ve ever done it.”

Frewin did not smile, the unconscious humour of the phrase did not seem to strike him; he was upset.

“It was a dirty trick to play on a chap,” said he at last, “and Lambert shall pay me out for it.”

“No, come, that ain’t fair,” said Letty quickly. “It was a dirty trick, and I knew that soon as ever I’d done it, but it was me that did it, and it’s me as has got to pay.”

“Ye seem bound to stand up for Lambert,” growled Frewin.

Letty looked up; she clenched her fist.

“I ’ate ’im,” said she between her teeth. “Yes, I do,” she repeated, though half shame-facedly, as he gazed at her surprised. “I ’ate ’im, ’cos it was ’im as made me do it.”

“’Ate ’im, do you?” echoed Frewin, with the ghost of a contented smile. “Well, may be that’s fair.”

“I don’t care if it’s fair or no,” declared Letty stoutly. “May be it ain’t, for I’d ought to ha’ known better myself, but I ’ate ’im all the same. Though that ain’t no reason why you should mention the matter to ’im, for it stands to reason I’d no call to agree to what ’e said, and it’s me as ’as got to pay.”

“It was ’e ought to ha’ known better,” grumbled Frewin again, still with a scowl on his honest face, “for ’e’s a man, and you expect a man to know better nor a girl.” But, after a pause, the scowl fading just a trifle, and the smile broadening instead: “So you ’ate ’im, do you?” he asked once more.

Letty dried her eyes afresh, and it was her turn to smile just a wee little bit. She had watched these symptoms before—for was she not the village belle?—and even in the midst of her misery and remorse she could not help smiling as she recognized them under a new guise.

“O’ course I do,” she repeated emphatically. Then she turned and pulled down another sheet off the line, and another and another, till her arms were quite full.

Meanwhile Frewin stood watching her, indecision in every line of his face and figure. She was very pretty, very graceful about her work, very strong and hearty. Her fresh cheeks were pink even amid the pink blossom, and her golden hair shone against the golden sky, where the sun was setting on a bank of soft rose-washed grey clouds behind the trees of the orchard.

“I s’pose anyways ye are sure to be taken up to-morrow evening?” said he at last. “A pretty girl like you always is o’ Sundays.”

“Well, if you know as I’m taken up, I s’pose I must be,” said she with a little pout.

“Ye didn’t answer just now,” he said.

“Maybe ye didn’t ask,” retorted she.

“Well, there, I’ll ask now,” said he with a bit of a shame-faced laugh. “Ye ’ave got a way with ye, miss, and no mistake!”

“Don’t ask to please me,” she said with the old toss of the little head. But the smile took the venom out of the words, and Frewin bowed beneath it as he had been slowly bowing ever since he first felt the flash of it.

“No, I’ll ask to please myself,” said he. And he went up to her and took her one free hand in his. Then the blushes crept right up into the bright hair, and there was silence.

“But we won’t walk hereabouts,” murmured she after a pause. “I’d not like to meet—folks. I tell ye what I should like if mother ’ll spare me, and that’d be for to go off right early and up in the train to see yer poor mother.”

“Would ye now?” declared he, well satisfied. “She’d be rare and pleased. Then that’s what we’ll do.”

The grey eyes stole a look at him.

“And by-gones to be by-gones?” begged she timidly. “And not a word to Charlie Lambert?”

He frowned a little.

“That’s as I sees fit,” said he.

“No, it’s as I sees fit,” murmured she softly, and her face was very close to his.

He smiled vaguely.

“You leave Charlie Lambert to me,” she added presently. “He pretty soon knew I was off it as soon as I was on. He’s got a flea o’ mine in his ear a’ready, and ’e’ll ’ave another if ’e don’t look out. You leave ’em all to me.”

“I s’pose everybody’s bound to do yer bidding sooner or later,” laughed Frewin half ruefully, “me as well as most.”

“Yes, don’t you make no mistake about that,” smiled she. “And what’s more, don’t ye ever go for to fancy that because I was such a bold-faced silly as to lay that wager I ever went for to win it. If ever there was a man I didn’t try to catch, it was you.”

Frewin laughed.

“Ye’ve caught me though,” said he.

“That’s as may be,” she said. “But I was too frightened at what I’d done to fish for you.”

“P’r’aps that’s ’ow ye caught me then,” he said. “And p’r’aps that’s ’ow I must needs forgive ye!”

So the wager was won, but never paid.

For the trip to town was so deftly managed from a neighbouring station in the early hours of the Sunday, that nobody guessed it had taken place; and on the evening of the same day upon the old bridge, Letty swore a bold, brave lie that she had lost what she declared she had never tried to win. The laugh against her was loud, but then so was her own in reply, and when, six weeks later, instead of accepting Mr. Lambert’s gloves, she accepted Bob Frewin himself, she was too happy to care which way the laugh went. But to tell the truth, folk are good-natured enough; and if the girls suspected Letty’s little fraud, and, nudging one another, declared she was a clever one, they had no objection to her triumph, for Charlie Lambert was the better match of the two, and he was left for somebody else.