Just such an evening the two cronies had passed on the day previous to this sudden invitation to go to Miss Sibby’s.

Rosemary hated to go. She knew to do so would involve the sacrifice of their evening readings.

“Oh, Aunt Sukey,” she said, as she buttoned up her blue bombazet pelisse—“oh, to think that we had got into such an interesting part of ‘The Children of the Abbey!’ Amanda had just met Lord Mortimer! And now it will be a week, or maybe a fortnight, before we can go on with it.”

“Never mind, Rosemary. Your mother lets you stay with me nearly always, and you are her only child, too, and she is a widow; so when she sends for us we must go,” said Aunt Sukey.

“Oh, yes, I know; but Amanda and Lord Mortimer——”

“Never mind Amanda and Lord Mortimer; they can wait until we come back. Now roll up your quilt pieces, and we will put them in my bag. Come! are you ready?”

“Yes, Aunt Sukey, soon as I have pulled on my mits.”

“Now we must go and take leave of Molly and the children,” said Miss Grandiere.

But as she spoke, there entered from the door on the right of the fireplace a pretty, fragile woman of about forty-five years of age, who, with the exception of her fair skin, blue eyes and brown hair, bore not the slightest resemblance to her tall, stately and handsome sister. She was dressed in a brown, linsey gown, white apron, white neck shawl and white cap. She was closely followed by two little girls of ten and twelve years of age, fair and blue-eyed, like their mother, with frocks that seemed to have been cut off the same piece as their mother’s gown. These were the two children of the house—Erina and Melina Elk.

“Why, I have just heard from Dan that you are going Down on the Bay,” said the newcomer.

“Yes; Dolly Hedge has sent for us; and as I wanted to go so as to see the wedding at All Faith on Tuesday, I think it is rather lucky that she has sent.”

“How long are you going to stay?”

“Until after the wedding, certainly; perhaps longer.”

“Well, I do feel so ashamed of the Forces for throwing off their own flesh and blood for the sake of a stranger and a foreigner, that I have no patience with them; and I wouldn’t go to the wedding, no, not if it was next door!”

“But, Molly, the young lady fell in love with the English officer; and I think it was very noble of her father to sacrifice his own dearest hopes on the shrine of his daughter’s happiness.”

“Oh, don’t talk to me about shrines and sacrifices! That’s all out of the romances you wear your eyes out reading at night. I believe in neighbors and in kinsfolks, not in strangers and foreigners. There!”

“Well, Molly, you have a right to your own opinions, and the Forces have a right to theirs. You must admit that!”

“Yes; and the heathen have a right to theirs, I suppose you think, Sukey.”

“No; that is carrying the matter too far. But good-by, Molly. We must go now. We will be back as soon as we can.”

The departing ones kissed their relatives, and went out to the block, where Dan stood holding the horse.

Henny followed with a heavy shawl, which she folded and laid upon the saddle.

“Mind, girl; as soon as you have cleaned up the room, get ready and come after us. We may stay longer than we expect Down on the Bay, so you must bring a change of clothes with you. Be sure to start from here in time to get to Oldfield before night. I don’t like, the idea of your going through the forest alone after dark,” said Miss Grandiere.

“Nebber you fear, Miss Sukey. I be down at Olefiel’ by de time yo’ dere yo‘se’f—fo’ sundown, anyhow,” said the negro girl, as she helped her mistress to climb into the saddle, and then lifted Rosemary up to a seat behind her.

“Now, Miss Rose’ry, yo’ hole on tight. Put yo’ arms ‘roun’ yo’ Aunt Sukey’s waist, and hole on tight. Don’t you slip off! Look’ee here, yo’ nigger Dan; yo’ walk ’longside ob dis chile, case she fall off. Tell yo’ wot, nigger, ef dis chile fall off an’ break her arm or anyfing, yo’ better not show yo’ face at Olefiel’—nor likewise here, needer! Yo’ hears me, doan yo’?”

“Oh, Aunt Henny, I am not going to fall off; nor neither would Dan let me. Poor Dan! Don’t scold him beforehand,” pleaded Rosemary.

“High, chile, ’twould be too late to scold arterward. Wot I sez is, do you’ scoldin’ an’ yo’ whippin’ ‘fo’ dere’s any cause fer it—’taint no good to do it arterward; ’twon’t ondo nuffin’ wot’s done,” said Henny; but her wisdom was lost on the party, who had already started on their way, aunt and niece riding double, and Dan walking beside the horse.

Their way lay over snow-covered ground, through bare woods, up and down rolling hills, and over frozen streams.

It was three o’clock in the afternoon when they emerged from the last piece of woods and entered upon a cultivated clearing, in which stood an old-fashioned farmhouse, with a steep roof with gable ends, dormer windows, and wide porches, surrounded by its barn, granaries and negro quarters.

As Miss Grandiere pulled up at the horse block before the door, a lady, tall, stately, handsome, with a fair complexion, blue eyes and brown hair, very like Miss Grandiere herself, and handsomely dressed in a puce-colored silk pelisse, and a beaver bonnet, appeared at the door, and said:

“You haven’t time to stop, Sukey. Sally and the children are all well, and are in the storeroom picking over apples. You can see them when we come home this evening; but now we must hurry; so you just get down and set the child in your seat, and let Dan lead the horse, and we will walk through the woods to Miss Sibby’s. I don’t know what is going on there, but something is.”

“I thought it was hot biscuits out of the new flour,” said Miss Grandiere.

“Yes, it is that, too,” replied Mrs. Hedge, without perceiving the sarcasm; “but there is something else—something that that wild young blade, Roland Bayard, and that young Midshipman Force, have on foot. I know there is!”

“Roland Bayard! Has he come home?”

“So Gad says. I couldn’t get much out of that nigger, though. He said he was in a hurry, and hadn’t time to stop. He said he had to carry that bag of wheat to the mill and get it ground, and carry it back home in time to make bread for supper; so you see I couldn’t get much out of him.”

By this time the new order of procession was formed, and the sisters walked on together, followed by little Rosemary on the saddle, and Dan leading the horse.

“I should not think,” said Miss Grandiere, “that young Midshipman Force would feel very much like skylarking after such a disappointment and mortification as he has had.”

“No would you, now? But then he was a mere boy, and she only a child, when they were engaged; and then after three years, you know, both might have changed their minds,” suggested practical Mrs. Hedge.

“I don’t know,” sighed sentimental Miss Grandiere.

“Well, I tell you, of all the scapegrace, devil-may-care, never-do-well, neck-or-nothing boys that ever lived or died in this world, that Roland Bayard is the very worst! I am sorry young Force has anything to do with him.”

“I don’t think he is evil at heart,” pleaded Miss Grandiere.

“‘Evil at heart’” repeated Mrs. Hedge, reflectively. “No, perhaps not.”

“He is a little wild, to be sure.”

“‘A little wild!’ He is enough to break Miss Sibby’s heart!”

“I don’t see why. He is no kin to her.”

“No; but she loves him as if he were her only son. She liked to have cried her eyes out when he went to sea, you know.”

“Yes, I know. And yet it was as good a career as he could enter upon. The merchant service is not so genteel as the navy, to be sure, but, then, it is really more promising, in a lucrative point of view, and a young man of no family need not mind about the gentility.”

“Yet that is just what grieved Miss Sibby’s heart—that her adopted nephew should be obliged to gratify his passion for the sea by entering the merchant service instead of the United States Navy.”

“Poor Miss Sibby! It is hard to say whether her pride in her own descent or her love for her adopted nephew is her ruling passion,” concluded Miss Grandiere, with a smile.

Their walk had now brought them to the borders of a frozen creek, on the other side of which stood a small farmhouse, surrounded by a few outbuildings.

This was “Forest Rest,” or “Miss Sibby’s,” as it was frequently called.

At the open door stood a short, stout old lady, in a homespun brown linsey gown, a white apron, and a white cap.

She had seen the approach of visitors from her window, and had come out to welcome them.

“How do? How do?” she exclaimed, holding out both hands and shaking them, right and left. “How dee do? Why, I’m mighty proud to see you! Come in! Come in out’n the cold!” she added, as she led her visitors through the front door that opened immediately into the principal room of the house.

It was a large, homely room, with whitewashed walls, bare floor, large open fireplace, and two front windows, shaded with blue paper blinds. It was plainly furnished with a pine table, chip chairs, corner cupboard, tall clock, and all the usual features of the rustic parlor. Its great redeeming point was the glowing fire of oak logs that burned in the broad chimney.

“Come right here and sit down, and get a good warm before you take off your things. Make yourself comfortable, sez I! never mind looks,” said Miss Sibby, drawing chairs close to the hearth for her half frozen guests.

“So Roland has come home, I hear, Miss Sibby,” began Mrs. Hedge, as she stretched her benumbed fingers over the fire.

“Yes, he has, safe and sound; thanks be to the Lord! He got home the very selfsame day that young Le Force arrove; though nyther of them knowed anything about the other’s coming ’til they met by accident at old Luke Barriere’s store. Now, wasn’t that a coinference? ‘Truth is stranger nor friction,’ sez I.”

“Is he going to sea again, Miss Sibby?” inquired Miss Grandiere.

“Well, I reckon sooner or later he must go, if he won’t do nothing else. A young youth must do something for a living, sez I; and if he don’t do one thing he must do another, sez I. But I do hope next time as he may get a berth along of your brother George. When is Capting Grandiere expected home?”

“I don’t know. He was at Rio de Janeiro when we heard from him last.”

“Ah me! so far as that? That’s on the coast of Guinea, ain’t it?”

“No; Brazil, South America.”

“Well, Lord knows that’s far enough. I did hope as the Kitty would be coming home soon, and Roland could get a berth ’long o’ Capting Grandiere. But there’s nothing but disappointment in this world, sez I!”

“The worst case of disappointment I know of is that of poor young Leonidas Force!” said Mrs. Hedge.

“Now ain’t it, though” chimed in Miss Sibby.

“To come home to meet his sweetheart, and find her just about to be married to another man!”

“And him a furriner! That’s what makes me sick! A furriner! Them as has the least to do with furriners, sez I, comes the best off, sez I! It’s all the gal’s fault, too! She fell in love along of this furriner! And her father, he give in to her, ’cause she cried and took on! But, Lor’! what could you expect of the young thing, sez I? ‘Trot sire, trot dam,’ sez I, ‘the colt will never pace,’ sez I! And you may take my word for that.”

“What do you mean, Miss Sibby? How do you apply the proverb to this case?” inquired Miss Grandiere.

“Why, don’t you see? What did her daddy do? ’Stead o’ marrying of some old neighbor’s darter, like you, Miss Sukey——”

“No, I thank you!” put in Miss Grandiere.

“Or me,” continued Miss Sibby, without noticing the interruption, “or some other, as everybody knows all about, what did he go and do? Why, he went ’way out yonder to the Devil’s Icy Peak, summers, and married of a stranger and a furriner, and a heathen and a pagan, for aught he knew! and fetches of her home here to us! That’s what her daddy did! And now, what did her mammy do? Why, ’stead o’ marrying of one of her own countrymen and kinsfolks, she ups and marries a ’Merican man as was a stranger and furriner to her; and a heathen and a pagan for aught that she knew.”

“But they loved one another; there is no question of that,” pleaded Miss Grandiere.

“What if they did? That’s the contrariness of it, sez I! What call had either of ’em be ’a loving of strangers and furriners and a marrying of them, sez I? And now the gal has done just as her father and mother did before her! Turned her back on her own kith and kin, and took up ’long of a stranger and a furriner, and a heathen and a pagan, for aught she knows, sez I! It’s in the blood, sez I! ‘Trot sire, trot dam,’ sez I! ‘and the colt’ll never pace,’ sez I! And now, ladies, if you have thawed out and will take off your bonnets and things, I will put them away. But maybe you would rather go to a bedroom?”

“Yes,” said Miss Grandiere, rising and going to a door on the side leading into an inner chamber.

“Oh! stop. Don’t go in there, please, Miss Sukey, I—I have got a strange lady in there,” hastily exclaimed their hostess.

“A strange lady!” repeated Miss Grandiere, in surprise.

“Yes—leastways a strange woman. I don’t know about a lady; for if you’re not acquainted with a person, sez I, you can’t tell if they are ladies or no. But come upstairs and I will tell you about her, or leastways all I know about her. Lor’, I sometimes s’picions as maybe she’s Roland’s mother!”