ned it. It's a thing
his wife will be proud of, if he is ever married, Susan Posey,"
(blushes,) "and his children too," (more blushes running up to her back
hair,) "and there 's nothing to be worried about. But I'll tell you
what, my dear, I've got a little business that calls me down the river
tomorrow, and I shouldn't mind stopping an hour at Alderbank and seeing
how our young friend Clement Lindsay is; and then, if he was going to
have a long time of it, why we could manage it somehow that any friend
who had any special interest in him could visit him, just to while away
the tiresomeness of being sick. That's it, exactly. I'll stop at
Alderbank, Susan Posey. Just clear up these two children for me, will
you, my dear? Isosceles, come now,--that 's a good child. Helminthia,
carry these sugar-plums down--stairs for me, and take good care of them,
mind!"

It was a case of gross bribery and corruption, for the fortress was
immediately, evacuated on the receipt of a large paper of red and white
comfits, and the garrison marched down--stairs much like conquerors,
under the lead of the young lady, who was greatly eased in mind by the
kind words and the promise of Mr. Byles Gridley.

But he, in the mean time, was busy with thoughts she did not suspect. "A
young person," he said to himself,--"why a young person? Why not say a
boy, if it was a boy? What if this should be our handsome truant?--'June
16th, Thursday morning!'--About time to get to Alderbank by the river, I
should think. None of the boats missing? What then? She may have made a
raft, or picked up some stray skiff. Who knows? And then got
shipwrecked, very likely. There are rapids and falls farther along the
river. It will do no harm to go down there and look about, at any rate."

On Saturday morning, therefore, Mr. Byles Gridley set forth to procure a
conveyance to make a visit, as he said, dawn the river, and perhaps be
gone a day or two. He went to a stable in the village, and asked if they
could let him have a horse.

The man looked at him with that air of native superiority which the
companionship of the generous steed confers on all his associates, down
to the lightest weight among the jockeys.

"Wal, I hain't got nothin' in the shape of a h'oss, Mr. Gridley. I've got
a mare I s'pose I could let y' have."

"Oh, very well," said the old master, with a twinkle in his eye as sly as
the other's wink,--he had parried a few jokes in his time,--"t